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SPEECHES U CONGRESS. 






JOSHUA R. GID DINGS 




BOSTON: 

PUBLISHED BY JOHN P. JEWETT AND COMPANY. 

CLEVELAND, OHIO: 

JEWETT, PROCTOR AND WORTHINGTON. 

LONDON : SAMTSON LOW, SON & CO. 

1853. 









JSntered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1853, by 

JOHN P. JEWETT & COMPANY, 

in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the District of Massachusetts. 



CAMBRIDGE : 

ALLEN AND FARNHAM, PRINTERS. 
REMINGTON 8TREET 



PREFACE 



When, fifteen years sinee, I entered Congress, the 
nation was engaged in the Florida War. Our army 
was actively employed in capturing and returning fugi- 
tive slaves to their owners ; and I then learned that 
hostilities had been commenced for that purpose ; while 
the principal expense was expected to be borne by the 
people of the free States. 

Conscious that they were not informed of those facts, 
I commenced a series of Speeches intended to show 
the manner in which the freemen of the North were 
involved in the expense, the crimes, and disgrace of 
southern slavery ; while at the same time I would trace 
as clearly as possible the constitutional line of demar- 
cation intended by the founders of our government, to 
separate us from the burdens and responsibilities of 
that institution. 

In compiling this volume, I have selected only those 
Speeches which have reference to that subject, omitting 
such portions as relate to other questions, or which 
constitute a re-argument of some point previously ex- 



IV PREFACE. 

amined. The work contains my views upon all ques- 
tions touching slavery which have been presented to 
the consideration of Congress, since I have been a 
member of that body. 

J. R. GIDDINGS. 
Jefferson, Ohio, March 18, 1853. 



CONTENTS 



THE FLORIDA WAR. 

Causes of its Commencement and Renewal — Its Character and Designs ex- 
posed — The Freedom of Debate vindicated Page 1 



REDUCTION OF THE ARMY. 

Exclusive Jurisdiction of Congress over Commerce and Navigation — Slavery- 
limited to the Jurisdiction of the Power creating it — No Powers vested in 
the Executive, by which he can involve the People of the free States in the 
support of the Slave-trade — The Rights of a Representative vindicated 21 



THE AMERICAN SLAVE-TRADE. 

Legislative Strategy to maintain it — Its Character — Fraud practised by our 
Minister at London — Congressional Legislation to encourage it — Moral 
Responsibility of Legislators — Right of the People to be exempt from its 
Crimes . .32. 



RIGHTS OF THE STATES CONCERNING SLAVERY. 

Power of the Federal Government in time of War — Jurisdiction of Congress 
in time of Peace over District of Columbia — Duty of Members to meet the 
Question of Slavery — Right of the People to petition Congress relating to 
Slavery 52 



THE AMISTAD NEGROES. 

History of their Importation and Escape — Their Rights under the Law of 
Nations — Our Duties toward them — Our Treaty Stipulations — Attempt of 
the Senate to modify the Law of Nations by Resolution — Timidity of Sena- 
tors- .... 73. 



VI CONTENTS. 



ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 



Designs of its Advocates — Payment of her Debts — Objections to that Meas- 
ure — Guaranties of* Slavery — Rights of the several States . . 97 



ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 

Its Effect in rendering the other States liable to pay her Debts — To perform 
her Treaties — Objects of Annexation — Effect upon Slavery — To increase 
the Expense of our Army — Our Navy — Our Post-Office System — Our 
Land System — To corrupt our Morality 119 



JOINT OCCUPATION OF OREGON. 

By annexing Texas, we commenced the Policy of extending our Territory — 
Duty to continue it until the balance of Power between the Slave and free 
States be restored — Prophecy that the President will surrender a portion of 
our Territory in Oregon 148 



INDIAN TREATIES. 

That of Eighteen Hundred and Forty-Four examined — Efforts to keep its 
Character from the Public — Not seen by Members of the House — Our 
Policy in compelling the Indians to return Fugitive Slaves exposed . 164 



THE MEXICAN WAR. 

Standing Army — Military Conquests dangerous to the Conquerors — Presi- 
dent's Statements erroneous — Revolution of our Government — Loss of 
Human Life Foretold — Devotion of Mexicans to their Government — War 
commenced by the President . . 177 



THE WILMOT PROVISO. 

Its Adoption advocated — Threats of Southern Members — Northern Men must 
take Position— Objects of Civil Government — Our past policy . . 202 



PRIVILEGES OF MEMBERS OF CONGRESS. 

Misrepresentations corrected — The Resolution denned — Right of Members to 
visit Public Institutions — Mobs — Their Designs — Encouraged by Mem- 
bers — Defiance — Attacks repelled 221 



CONTENTS. Vil 



MEXICAN WAR. 



Duty of Statesmen to foretell Political Events — Prophecy fulfilled — Execu- 
tive Faith violated in the Surrender of Oregon — Control of the Government 
by the Slave Power — The Effect of annexing Foreign Territory . 250 



THE PRESIDENT'S ANNUAL MESSAGE. 

Its Sophistry — Its Misrepresentations — Its Contradictions — National Pros- 
perity changed to a state of War — Character of the War — Opposition to it 
vindicated — Withdrawal of the Army and Tender of Peace advocated 265 



PAYMENT FOR SLAVES. 

Man cannot be made Property — View of those who framed the Constitu- 
tion — Military Power to impress Slaves — May set them Free — No Consti- 
tutional Power to pay the Public Moneys for Slaves — Rights of the Free 
States — History of Congressional Legislation on this subject . . 289 



MEXICAN WAR. 

Its Expense — Position of the Whig Party — Their Position of 1844 — Their 
Change — Their Candidate — His Position — Union of the Whigs and Demo- 
crats 319 



RELATION OF THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT TO SLAVERY. 

Position of Southern Statesmen — Objects for which this Government was 
formed — Address of Southern Members examined — Its Doctrines ex- 
posed — Rights of the People of the Free States — Their Duties in regard 
to Fugitive Slaves — The Domestic Slave-trade — Course of the Speaker of 
the House of Representatives, and Deceptions of the Whig Party exposed — 
Objects of the Free Democracy stated — Their Course vindicated — Pro- 
gress of the Cause of Liberty 333 



SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES. 

His Powers — Dictates the Business of that Body — The Manner of his 
Election in Eighteen Hundred and Forty-nine — The former Speaker — 
His Change of Position — His Support of the Mexican War — Of Slavery 
in the Territories — Of the Slave-trade in the District of Columbia — 



Vlll CONTENTS. 

Eejected by the Advocates of Liberty — The Whig Party — Their Change 
in relation to the Slave-trade — Those who thus changed, subsequently 
appointed to Office — Course of the Free Democracy vindicated . 364 



CALIFORNIA. 

Her Right of Admission to the Union — Complaints of Slave-holders — Their 
Character — Character of our Government — Its Objects defined — Sla- 
very in Fact, and in Law — Manner of its Existence — History of its 
Exclusion from our Territories — From the High Seas — Arguments exam- 
ined — Doctrine of leaving it to exist in Territories refuted . . 391 



NEW MEXICO. 

Its Ancient Boundaries — Its Government — Its Conquest — Our Duty to its 
People — Claims of Texas — Payment of Money to Texas — Its Object — 
Agitation — Laws of Progress — They cannot be resisted — Dissolution of 
:the Union ridiculed — Northern Servility reproved .... 403 



ANNUAL MESSAGE OF THE PRESIDENT. 

Declaration of his Present Position — His Former Doctrines — His Change of 
Principles — His Violations of Whig Principles — His Devotion to Sla- 
very — His Friendship for the "Fugitive Law" — The Character of that 
Law — Its Barbarity exposed — Its Unconstitutionality — Feeling of the 
Northern People 420 



AGITATION OF THE SLAVE QUESTION. 

Business of the House neglected, under pretence of avoiding Agitation — Agi- 
tation precipitated upon that Body at improper Periods — Agitation by the 
Secretary of State and his Friends — The President's Proclamation — His 
Powers defined — His Authority over the House denied — Independence of 
Representatives vindicated — Indelicacy of Mr. Clay exposed — His Dicta- 
tion spurned — His Attack upon the Negroes of Boston reproved — Their 
Rights defended — Mr. Clay's Assault upon Mr. Thompson condemned — 
Attacks of Members upon Mr. Allen met, and Investigation challenged 445 



THE COMPROMISE MEASURES. 

The Acts of Congress which constitute them — Whigs and Democrats commit- 
ted to their support — The Character of those Laws — The Crime of sus- 



CONTENTS. IX 

taining them — Prospective increase of Slaves — Corresponding increase of 
Expense in supporting that Institution — The People of the Free States 
ought not to be involved in this Crime or Expense — They will separate 
themselves from them 467 



THE BALTIMORE PLATFORMS. 

They now constitute the Political Creed of their Parties — They agree in Prin- 
ciple — No Issue between them — Both those Parties are committed to sup- 
port the Compromise Measures — To suppress Discussion — Their combined 
Influence defied — Agitation will continue — It is an Element in all Re- 
forms — Reasons why Whigs and Democrats wish to suppress it — Its Effect 
on Public Men — On Public Measures — The Organization of the Free 
Democracy vindicated 488 



SPEECHES U CONGRESS 



THE FLORIDA WAR.* 

CAUSES OF ITS COMMENCEMENT AND RENEWAL — ITS CHAR- 
ACTER AND DESIGNS EXPOSED — THE FREEDOM OF DEBATE 
VLNDICATED. 

[The resolutions of the House of Representatives adopted in December, 1838, 
prohibiting debate on the subject of slavery, created much feeling throughout 
the free States. The tyranny by which silence was thus imposed upon North- 
ern members was deeply -felt by Messrs. Adams, Slade, and Giddings, who 
held frequent consultations as to the best mode of regaining the freedom of 
debate. Mr. Giddings proposed to test the extent to which they would be per- 
mitted to discuss subjects collaterally involving the institution of slavery, and 
volunteered to make the effort. He selected the Florida war as his subject, 
and so prepared his remarks as to give them a direct bearing upon the bill 
under consideration ; while his principal object was to expose the manner in 
which the war had been waged and conducted for the purpose of sustaining 
slavery. This effort proving successful, others of similar character followed, 
until the repeal of the " gag-rules," as they were called, took place, and the 
freedom of debate was regained.] 

Mr. Giddings said he was pleased to hear that the pros- 
pect of terminating this war was so favorable ; yet (said he) I 
am somewhat incredulous as to its immediate termination by the 
means presented by the gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. 
Thompson). 

In order that our legislation shall conduce to its early close, 

* Speech upon the bill appropriating one hundred thousand dollars for the 
removal of certain Seminole chiefs and warriors west of the Mississippi. 
Delivered hi Committee of the whole House on the state of the Union, Febru- 
ary 9, 1841. 

1 



2 THE FLORIDA WAR. 

we must act with reference to the causes which have unfortu- 
nately involved us in hostilities. This war has occupied the 
attention of the Executive for the last five years; our whole 
military force has been employed to carry it forward ; our offi- 
cers and soldiers have fallen victims to the climate ; our funds 
have been squandered ; but the propriety of this vast expenditure 
of life and treasure have been kept from the public view. It 
Is somewhat extraordinary, that in all the discussions relating 
to this war, which have occurred in this House and in the Sen- 
ate, no member has attempted to explain the causes of its com- 
mencement, its subsequent renewal after a solemn armistice, or 
the manner in which it has been conducted. 

The speech of the honorable gentleman from Vermont (Mr. 
Everett), delivered two years since, exposed the manner in 
which we violated our treaty stipulations with the Indians, 
while we exacted of them a strict observance of their cove- 
nants ; but he stopped at that point, omitting all reference to 
the more immediate cause of hostilities. 

Before I proceed to that part of my subject, I wish to cor- 
rect the impression which prevails, to some extent, that we are 
endeavoring to remove the Indians for the purpose of occupy- 
ing their lands. That report is erroneous; the lands are of 
very trifling importance. General Jessup, who has a j>erfect 
knowledge of their quality, in an official communication to the 
War Department, says : 

" These lands would not pay for the medicines used by our troops while 
employed against the Indians." 

By the treaty of Payne's Landing, entered into in May, 
1832, the Seminole Indians agreed to emigrate west of the 
Mississippi upon certain conditions. These conditions were 
not performed on our part. The Indians were, therefore, 
under no moral obligations to emigrate, and they declined 
doing so. 

The reasons for this refusal may be found in House Docu- 
ment, 225, 3d Session, 25th Congress, in an official letter of 
Wiley Thompson, Indian Agent, to William P. Duval, Gover- 
nor of Florida, dated January 1, 1834, in which he says : 



THE FLORIDA WAR. 3 

" The principal causes which operate to cherish this feeling, hostile to emi- 
gration, are, first, the fear that their reunion with the Creeks, which will sub- 
ject them to the government and control of the Creek national council, will be 
a surrender of a large negro property, now held by those people, to the Creeks, 
as an antagonist claimant." 

Thus, Sir, we have official intelligence that the principal 
cause of the war was the fear of losing this " negro property." 
And we are led to inquire into the history of these conflicting 
claims to the " negro property " between the Creeks and Senii- 
noles. 

In the letter above quoted, General Thompson, speaking fur- 
ther on the subject, says : 

" The Creek claim to negroes now in the possession of the Seminole Indians, 
which is supposed to be the first cause of hostility to the emigration of the lat- 
ter tribe, grows out of the treaty of 1821 between the United States and the 
former." 

We have now arrived at the causes which deterred the Sem- 
inoles from emigrating west of the Mississippi. Mr. Thomp- 
son, from his long and intimate acquaintance with the Seminole 
chiefs, and from the confidence they reposed in him, possessed 
the best possible means of intelligence on this subject; and 
no one will doubt the accuracy of the information which he has 
given. Yet, few of the members now present will fully under- 
stand his reference to the reunion of the Seminoles with the 
Creek Indians, or " the surrender of a large negro property" 
which was claimed by the latter. I am, therefore, constrained 
to refer to some historical facts, to elucidate those points. 

Formerly, the Seminoles constituted a part of the Creek 
tribe. They lived together, and were known only as one peo- 
ple. Their " lower towns " were in Florida, while their " upper 
towns " extended far up into Georgia. The different portions 
of this tribe were first contradistinguished by the term " Lower 
Creeks" and "Upper Creeks." Subsequently, circumstances 
brought upon the " Lower Creeks " the name of " runaways" 
which, in their language, is expressed by the word " Seminoles." 
The term originally had reference to the fugitive slaves of 
Georgia, who found an asylum in these " lower towns," but in 



4 THE FLORIDA WAR. 

process of time gradually came to be applied to the Indians of 
those towns as well as the negroes who settled with them. 

These slaves left their masters between 1770 and 1790, and 
fleeing into the Indian country passed on to the " lower Creek 
towns," where they settled, and many of them intermarried 
with the Indians and became connected with them in all the 
relations of domestic life. Their owners could not retake 
them ; but called on the authorities of Georgia, who demanded 
of the President of the United States the interposition of our 
national influence to assist in regaining their slaves. The 
President complied; but where he found the constitutional 
authority for such a prostitution of our national character, 
neither he nor any other man has deigned to inform us. But, 
by his orders, an agreement was entered into by the Creeks, 
in their treaty with the United States of 1791, to return those 
fugitives to their masters. When the Creeks came to perform 
their stipulations in this respect, they found the fugitives con- 
nected with the Seminoles in the relations of husband and wife, 
of parents and children, from which they could not be separa- 
ted. The performance of their stipulation in this respect was, 
therefore, indefinitely postponed. 

In 1821, by treaty at Indian Spring, they surrendered to 
the United States a large tract of land, for which we stipulated 
to pay them four hundred and fifty thousand dollars. Of this 
sum, two hundred and fifty thousand dollars was retained as a 
trust fund, from which the President was to pay the slave- 
holders of Georgia for their slaves who resided in the " lower 
towns," and were connected with the " Lower Creeks ; " while 
the whole nation were interested in the territory ceded to our 
government. This created a conflict of interest between the 
Creeks proper and the " Seminoles." 

The President, in pursuance of the treaty, instituted a com- 
mission to examine and adjust the claims of the slave-holders ; 
and, by allowing twice the real worth of each slave, as Mr. 
Wirt, Attorney- General, informs us, their aggregate value was 
found to be only one hundred and nine thousand dollars, leav- 



THE FLORIDA WAR. 

ing in the hands of this government one hundred and forty-one 
thousand dollars, which in equity belonged to the Indians. 
They called on the President and upon Congress to pay it 
over to them. But the slave-holders also claimed it. They 
sent their petitions to this body asking for it. These petitions 
were referred to a select committee, at the head of whom was 
Mr. Gilmer, a distinguished member from Georgia. That 
committee, after the most mature deliberation, reported to this 
body that the money "justly belonged to the owners of those 
fugitive slaves, as a compensation for the offspring which they 
would have home to their masters, had they remained in servi- 
tude." And it was paid to them by act of Congress. The 
" Upper Creeks," thus finding themselves robbed of their lands 
and money to pay for the slaves who then lived with the 
" Lower Creeks " or " Seminoles," at once determined to obtain 
a portion of those people and hold them as property. The 
Seminoles refused to surrender their wives and children to 
slavery ; and the Indians thus became separated, and hostile to 
each other in feeling and in interest. The Creeks proper emi- 
grated west of the Mississippi ; but their agents remained in 
Florida, demanding possession of those fugitives. Thus we 
see clearly, that if the Seminoles now emigrate and again unite 
with the Creeks, they will at once become subject to the Creek 
authorities, and their wives and children will be taken and held 
as slaves.* 



* The history of these fugitives is deeply interesting. About five hundred 
of them emigrated west with the Seminoles, in 1843. But they were afraid to 
go into the territory assigned to the Creeks, and with their Seminole friends 
settled on the " Cherokee lands." The Cherokees regarded them as trespassers. 
The Creeks were dissatisfied also, as they had hoped to get the slaves. The 
frontier was kept in constant apprehension of hostilities until December, 1846, 
when a treaty was entered into between the United States and these three 
tribes, each acting for themselves. All questions concerning these slaves were 
to be submitted to the President, and the Seminoles went to live with the 
Creeks, and were again united with them. 

In 1850, the Creeks seized and sold to planters in Louisiana about one hun- 
dred of these people. This created great alarm, and some two hundred escaped 
into Mexico with the Seminole chief " Wild Cat," after a severe battle with the 
Creeks, in which several were killed on each side. More than one hundred 
1* 



6 THE FLORIDA WAR. 

Under this state of circumstances, the Seminoles refused to 
emigrate. The government insisted upon such emigration, and 
ordered the army to Florida for the purpose of compelling them 
to remove west. Hostilities followed, and this war is the result. 
These fugitive slaves constituted the " negro property " to which 
Mr. Thompson, the Indian Agent, referred ; and their surrender 
to the Creeks as slaves would have resulted from their emigra- 
tion. 

Mr. Warren, of Georgia, called Mr. Giddings to order for 
irrelevancy. 

The Chairman decided the remarks of Mr. Giddings to be 
in order. 

Mr. Giddings. I regard this interposition of the federal 
power to sustain slavery as unwarranted by the Constitution. 
This war is, therefore, unconstitutional, unjust, and an outrage 
upon the rights of the people of the free States. 

Mr. Habersham, of Georgia, called Mr. Giddings to order, 
urging that Mr. Giddings's remarks were not relevant to the 
bill. 

The Chairman again decided that remarks upon the causes 
of the war were in order. 

Mr. Giddings. I hold, that, if the slaves of Georgia or of 
any other State leave their masters and go among the Indians, 
the federal government has no right, no constitutional power, 
to employ the army for their recapture, or to expend the 
national treasure to purchase them from the Indians.* It is a 
matter solely between the masters and slaves. We have no 
right to interfere. The slaves of the South are held in bon- 
dage by State laws. Slavery itself is a State institution, with 
which this government cannot rightfully interfere, either to 
sustain or to abolish it. This position is in such obvious 



were said to have escaped into Canada; and some few are reported as yet liv- 
ing with the Seminoles. — Vide " Speech on Indian Treaties:' 

* Since the year 1790, the federal government has been in the practice of 
lending its aid for the recapture of slaves. But this appears to have been done 
by general consent, no objection having been made until the delivery of this 



THE FLORIDA WAR. 7 

accordance with the Constitution, that I think no member will 
deny it. Indeed, this body, in December, 1838, by an almost 
unanimous vote, adopted a resolution expressive of this doc- 
trine. 

The Chairman informed Mr. Giddings that the discussion 
of those resolutions would not be in order. 

Mr. Giddings. I had no intention to discuss those resolu- 
tions. I merely cite one of them as an authority in favor of 
the doctrine I have laid down. It reads as follows : 

" Resolved, That this government is a government of limited powers. That, 
by the Constitution of the United States, it has no power whatever over the 
institution of slavery in the States of this Union." 

These, Sir, were the sentiments of one hundred and ninety- 
eight members of this body ; while only six voted against this 
doctrine. Every member from the slave States voted for it. 
Indeed, Southern statesmen from the first establishment of our 
government to this day, have, with unanimous voice, declared 
that Congress has no power over the institution of slavery within 
the States. Such, Sir, are the doctrines of the Constitution. 
That instrument has been violated, trampled upon, by these 
efforts to sustain slavery in Georgia. This war, in all its 
details, has been commenced, and is now carried on, by usurpa- 
tions of power unauthorized by the Constitution ; it is a viola- 
tion of the rights of the people, and dishonorable to our nation. 

I have now shown the reasons why the Seminoles refused to 
emigrate west of the Mississippi; and that our army was 
employed to constrain them to emigrate; and that hostilities 
arose from such attempts to remove them by force. 

Having called attention to the remote, and to some of the 
more immediate causes of this war, I will now ask attention to 
other facts and circumstances, which show that this war arose 
solely from the efforts of government to arrest the fugitive 
slaves of the South. 

On the 21st May, 1836, this House adopted a resolution, 
calling upon the then President for "information respecting 
the causes of the Florida war." On the 3d June, the President 
transmitted to the House sundry papers relating to that sub- 



8 THE FLORIDA WAR. 

ject, among which may be found an address or petition of 
nearly one hundred gentlemen, said to be among the principal 
inhabitants of Florida, calling on the President to interpose the 
power of the general government for the purpose of securing 
them in the possession of their slaves. These gentlemen, 
speaking of the Seminole Indians, say : 

" While this indomitable people continue where they now are, the owners of 
slaves in our territory, and even in the States contiguous, cannot, for a moment, 
in any thing like security, enjoy this kind of property." 

These gentlemen appear to have thought it the duty of the 
Executive to remove those Indians, in order that they might 
enjoy their slavery in greater security. The presence of those 
savages was unfavorable to civilized oppression ; and these 
professed Christians desired the removal of the barbarians, to 
enable them to commit the crimes of slavery with greater 
impunity. The President listened respectfully to their request, 
and indorsed on the petition an order directing the Secretary 
of War "to inquire into the charges, and, if found true, to 
direct the Indians to prepare forthwith to remove west of the 
Mississippi." 

The treaty of Payne's Landing, which had lain unnoticed for 
two years, was hunted up, and sent to the Senate for concur- 
rence. Orders were at once sent to different parts of the coun- 
try, directing a concentration of the army, in order to compel 
the Indians at the point of the bayonet to emigrate. 

These extraordinary efforts of the President to sustain sla- 
very, will constitute an interesting chapter in our political his- 
tory. I have no time now to comment upon them. They 
have been kept from the people, and my present object is to 
bring them forth to the public gaze. The address referred to, 



" There are now believed to be more than five hundred negroes among the 
Seminoles, three fourths of whom are fugitive slaves." * 

* More than five hundred of those who fled from Georgia, including their 
descendants, emigrated with the Indians west of the Mississippi; while an 
equal number, who were captured by our troops, were claimed by the peo- 
ple of Florida as their property, and delivered over to them as slaves. 



THE FLORIDA WAR. 9 

On the 20th January, 1834, Governor Duval, in a letter to 
the Commissioner of Indian Affairs, says : 

" The slaves belonging to the Indians have a controlling influence over the 
minds of their masters, and are entirely opposed to any change of residence. 
It will be best to adopt at once firm and decided measures; such as will 
demonstrate to the Indians the determination of government to see the treaty 
justly and fairly executed. This cannot be done until the bands of outlaws, 
(fugitive slaves,) mentioned in the agent's report, are arrested and broken up; 
for, so long as they are permitted to remain, every Indian that is unwilling to 
emigrate will seek their protection." 

No man, perhaps, possessed better knowledge of these facts 
than Governor Duval, who assures us that the negroes con- 
trolled the Indians, and that the Indians sought the protection 
and support of the fugitive slaves. This same officer, acting 
executive of the territory of Florida, in a letter dated January 
26th, 1834, says : 

" The slaves belonging to the Indians, must be made to fear for themselves 
before they will cease to influence the minds of their masters." " You may be 
assured that the first step towards the emigration of these Indians, must be the 
breaking up of the runaway slaves and outlaw Indians." 

Thus we are informed, that the war must be first waged 
against the fugitive slaves. And it was waged against those 
oppressed, friendless outcasts ; those unarmed wanderers who 
had fled from oppression, who had sought an asylum in the 
swamps and everglades of Florida, who had fled from the 
oppression of professed Christians, and sought protection of 
savage barbarians. Against them the warlike energies of this 
mighty nation were brought to bear, for no other cause than 
their love of liberty. 

Mr. Campbell, of South Carolina, called Mr. Giddings to 
order for assailing the institution of slavery. 

The Chairman said, the gentleman from Ohio, (Mr. Gid- 
dings,) had declared his intention to discuss the Florida war ; 
and the Chair had understood his remarks as having reference 
to that subject. 

Mr. Giddings resumed. I will assure the gentleman from 
South Carolina, (Mr. Campbell,) that I intend alluding to sla- 
very only so far as it stands connected with this war. This 



10 THE FLORIDA WAR. 

officer desired to have the war directed against the slaves, 
because they advised their masters in favor of liberty. The 
manner in which this was done, will appear from the official 
communication of the Indian Agent. On the 28th October, 
1834, General Thompson, in a letter addressed to the Commis- 
sioner of Indian Affairs, says : 

" There are many very likely negroes in this nation (Seminole). Some of the 
whites in the adjacent settlements manifest a restless desire to obtain them; and 
I have no doubt that Indian raised negroes are now in possession of the whites." 

Thus, Sir, it seems that kidnapping was not unknown in 
that country. This same accredited officer of government, 
on the 9th January, 1835, advises : 

" That an expedition should be set on foot for the double purpose of driving 
the Indians within their boundary, and capture negroes, many of whom, it is 
believed, are runaway slaves." 

And, Sir, our army was put in motion to capture negroes and 
slaves. Our officers and soldiers became slave-catchers, com- 
panions of the most degraded class of human beings who dis- 
grace that slave-cursed region. With the assistance of blood- 
hounds, they tracked the flying bondman over hill and dale, 
through swamp and everglade, until his weary limbs could sus- 
tain him no longer. Then they seized him, and, for the bounty 
of twenty dollars he was usually delivered over to the first white 
man who claimed him. Our troops became expert in this busi- 
ness of hunting and enslaving mankind. I doubt whether the 
Spanish pirates, engaged in the same employment on the Afri- 
can coast, are more perfect masters of their vocation. Nor 
was our army alone engaged in this war upon human rights. 
They merely followed the example of a class of land-pirates, 
who are ever ready to rob or murder when they can do so with 
impunity. On the 28th July, 1835, John Walker, one of the 
Appalachicola chiefs, belonging to the Seminole band, wrote 
General Thompson, Indian Agent, as follows : 

" I am," says he, "induced to write you, in consequence of the depredations 
making, and attempted to be made, upon my property, by a company of negro 
stealers, some of whom are from Columbus, Georgia, and have connected them- 
selves with Brown and Douglass. I should like your advice, how I am to act. 



THE FLORIDA WAR. 11 

I dislike to make any trouble, or to have any difficulty with any of the white 
people ; but, if they trespass upon my premises and my rights, I must defend 
myself in the best way I can. If they do make this attempt, and I have no 
doubt they wiU, they must bear the consequences. But is there no civil law to 
protect me ? Are the free negroes, and the negroes belonging in this town, 
to be stolen away publicly, and, in the face of all law and justice, carried off 
and sold, to fill the pockets of these worse than land pirates f Douglass and his 
company hired a man who has two large trained dogs for the purpose to come 
down and take Billey. He is from Mobile, and follows for a livelihood catching 
runaway negroes." 

This, Sir, is the language of a savage, addressed to his civil- 
ized neighbors. He called in vain for protection. A few days 
after the date of this letter, he was robbed of all his negroes ; 
so says the report of the United States Attorney, addressed to 
the Secretary of War, and dated April 21, 1836. But the num- 
ber of freemen who were enslaved is unknown to us. There 
was no one to speak for them. That hundreds of freeborn 
Americans were seized, enslaved, and now pine in bondage, no 
man can doubt who will carefully examine the official docu- 
ments connected with this war. I will give one more example 
of the piratical practice by which these Indians were robbed 
and the negroes enslaved. 

E-con-chattimico was also an Indian chief of the Seminole 
band, living upon the Appalachicola River, one who signed the 
treaty at Camp Moultrie, in 1832, by which we solemnly 
pledged the faith of this nation to protect the Indians in the 
enjoyment of their lives and property. This chief is said to 
have owned twenty slaves, valued at fifteen thousand dollars. 
These " negro stealers " were seen hovering around his planta- 
tion, and their object could not be misunderstood. By the 
advice of the sub-agent, he armed himself and people for the 
purpose of defending themselves. When the negro stealers 
learned that E-con-chattimico's people had armed themselves in 
defence of their liberty, (for they considered Indian slavery 
liberty compared with white slavery,) they raised a report that 
the Indians had armed themselves for the purpose of murder- 
ing the white people. On learning this, E-con-chattimico at 
once delivered up his arms to the white people, and threw him- 
self upon their protection. Disarmed, and unable to defend 



12 THE FLORIDA WAR. 

his people, they were immediately kidnapped, taken off, and 
sold into interminable bondage. E-con-chattimico now calls on 
us to pay him for the loss he has sustained in the violation of 
our treaty, in which we solemnly covenanted to protect him 
and his property. Robbed, abused, insulted, and deceived, he 
emigrated to the West, and now looks to us for a redress of the 
wrongs he has sustained. I give the substance of his statement 
as related by him in his petition to Congress, and communica- 
ted by General Thompson, Governor Duval, and the District 
Attorney of East Florida, and sworn to by several witnesses. 

These outrages upon the rights of the Indians and of the 
negroes, drove them to the necessity of protecting their liber- 
ties and their lives. They were thus constrained to take up 
arms in self-defence, and we soon found ourselves involved in 
this disastrous war. 

The men who committed these robberies and kidnapped 
these negroes were well known; for the acts were committed 
in open day. Their names and places of residence are dis- 
tinctly mentioned ; but I have yet to learn that any one of 
them has been punished in any manner for this warfare against 
the liberty of the blacks and the rights of the Indians. Indeed, 
it seems to have been an object with some of the officers em- 
ployed in Florida to induce government itself to enter into the 
business of capturing and selling slaves. J. W. Harris, Dis- 
bursing Agent of government, in a letter to the Commissary- 
General of Subsistence, dated December 30, 1836, says : 

" I would respectfully suggest, that you recommend to the honorable Secre- 
tary of War, that the annuity due to the hostile Indians be retained to defray 
the expenses of this war; and that the slaves who shall be captured, whom I 
believe to have been generally active instigators to our present troubles, be sold 
at public sale, and the proceeds appropriated to the same object.' 1 '' 

This is the first official proposition that has come to my knowl- 
edge for the government to enter into competition with the " ne- 
gro stealers" by capturing and selling slaves. We were engaged 
in open war with these people, who had sought liberty in the 
wilds of Florida. If they were captured, they would be prison- 
ers of war ; and for us to sell them as slaves, would be as much 



THE FLORIDA WAR. 13 

a violation of national honor as it would have been for them to 
have sold as slaves such of our people as they were able to 
capture. But the efforts of the more humane officers led to an 
armistice which, had it been observed in good faith by the citi- 
zens of Florida, would have been perpetual. 

On the 6th day of March, 1837, General Jessup entered into 
a conventional arrangement with the Seminole Indians, by 
which it was agreed that hostilities should immediately cease ; 
that the Indians should, emigrate west of the Mississippi; that 
they should be secure in their lives and property ; and " that 
negroes, their bond fide property," should accompany them. 
This arrangement revived the hopes of the friends of peace. 
They indulged the expectation that blood would cease to flow, 
and that safety to the Indians and to our own people would 
again extend oyer the territory. But these fond hopes were 
soon dispelled. 

Twelve days after this convention was entered into, a solemn 
remonstrance against it was signed by a number of gentlemen 
of high standing in Florida, and transmitted to the Secretary of 
War. These gentlemen totally objected to any pacification 
that did not provide for the recapture of their fugitive slaves. 
They objected to the Indians going West, until they should 
take <and return to their owners the slaves who had escaped 
from their masters in Florida. The remonstrance may be 
found at 55th page of Executive Document of the House of 
Representatives, No. 225 of the 3d Session of the 25th Con- 
gress. It is an interesting paper, but of too great length for me 
to read at this time. It shows, in a most palpable light, the 
views entertained by those gentlemen in regard to the object of 
this war. Whatever others may have thought upon that sub- 
ject, it is clear that they supposed the war to have been com- 
menced and carried on for the purpose of aiding them in hold- 
ing their slaves; and they declare it incompatible with the 
honor and dignity of the nation to permit the Indians to emi- 
grate, until they shall bring the slaves back to their owners. I 
have no doubt they felt that they were correct in their views ; 
nor do I believe they entertained a doubt of the justice and 
2 



14 THE FLORIDA WAK. 

propriety of taxing the people of the free States to any extent 
in supporting a war for slavery. There was, however, a cessa- 
tion of hostilities, notwithstanding these remonstrances. The 
Indians ceased for a time to plunder the defenceless families of 
Florida, to burn their cabins, and murder women and children ; 
but, Sir, the fugitive slaves remained yet hidden in the swamps 
and everglades of that country. Peace on such terms appears 
not to have been acceptable to the people of Florida. I will 
not speak the conclusions of my own mind, however, on this 
subject, but will avail myself of the statement of a high officer 
of government who was in command of our troops, and who 
spoke from positive knowledge. Indeed, Mr. Chairman, the 
facts connected with this renewal of hostilities are of such an 
extraordinary character, that I prefer they should rest upon the 
declaration of accredited officers. 

General Jessup, in a letter dated 29th March, 1837, and 
directed to Colonel John "Warren, speaking of the anxiety of 
the Indians to maintain the peace agreed upon, says : 

" There is no disposition on the part of the great body of the Indians to 
renew hostilities; and they will, I, am sure, faithfully fulfil their engagements, 
if the inhabitants of the territory be prndent. Bnt any attempt to seize their 
negroes or other property would be followed by an immediate resort to arms." 

Thus, we have the authority of General Jessup for saying 

that the Indians were anxious to maintain peace. That he was 

at the same time apprehensive that the people would attempt 

to seize the Indian negroes. What reason General Jessup had 

to suspect that the people of Florida would be otherwise than 

prudent, or what reason he had to fear that they would seize the 

Indian negroes, I know not. He certainly exhibited fears 

upon the subject, however. For, on the 5th April, being 

seven days subsequent to this letter to Colonel Warren, he 

issued a general order in the following words : 

" The Commanding-General has reason to believe that the interference o 
unprincipled white men with the negro property of the Seminole Indians, if not 
immediately checked, will prevent their emigration, and lead to a renewal of 
hostilities. 

The order goes on to prohibit any person not connected with 
the public service from entering upon the territory assigned to 



THE FLORIDA WAR. 15 

the Indians. In this order we have official intelligence that the 
whites did in fact interfere with the Indian slaves, or, in other 
words, they began to tod the Indians of their slaves almost as 
soon as hostilities ceased. As to the outrages committed upon 
the free blacks, during the suspension of hostilities, we have no 
information in this order, and are left to infer the course pur- 
sued towards them from the evidence I have previously given. 
On the 18th April, twelve days after the date of his letter to 
Colonel Warren, General Jessup wrote -to Governor Call, say- 
ing: 

" If the citizens of the territory be prudent, the war may be considered at an 
end. But any attempt to interfere with the Indian negroes would cause an 
immediate resort to hostilities. The negroes control their masters 5 and they 
have heard of the act of your legislative council. Thirty or more of the Indian 
negro men were at and near my camp on the Withlacoochie late in March. 
But the arrival of two or three citizens of Florida, said to be in search of 
negroes, caused them to dispei-se at once; and I doubt whether they will come 
in again. At all events, the emigration will be delayed a month, I apprehend, 
in consequence of the alarm of these negroes." 

It is quite evident that the Commanding- General was embar- 
rassed by attempts of the white people to seize upon negroes. 
Indeed, there appears to have been no difficulty in arranging 
the terms of peace ; but the peace could not be maintained in 
consequence of the rapacity of these slave-catchers. It is also 
quite evident that some of the people of Florida were restless 
under the order of the 5th of April, prohibiting them from 
entering the Indian country. When intelligence respecting 
that order reached St. Augustine, a public meeting was called, 
and a committee appointed to procure its repeal, in order that 
tne white people might enter the Indian country for the pur- 
pose of seizing slaves. 

This committee, said to be composed of men of high stand- 
ing, addressed a long letter to General Jessup, in which they 
say, speaking of the people of Florida : 

" While they believe that the accomplishment of a certain pacification must, 
as it ought, be an object of primary importance in these negotiations, they per- 
suade themselves that the preservation of the negro property, belonging to the 
inhabitants of this desolated country, must be seen by him to be an object of 
scarcely less moment." 



16 THE FLORIDA WAR. 

It is a most undeniable fact, borne out by every part of these 
official documents, that the people of Florida supposed that the 
great object of the war was to aid the slave-holders in capturing 
and recovering their slaves. This same protest goes on to 
recount facts in regard, to their slaves having run away, and 
finding a place of refuge in the Indian country, and the con- 
cluding of an armistice by General Jessup, without getting their 
slaves back ; and then the signers add : 

" Against such a course, so destructive of their rights and interests, the citi- 
zens of St. Augustine and others, in public meeting assembled, for themselves 
and on behalf of the inhabitants of East Florida generally, do most solemnly pro- 
test:' 

The people of Florida appear to have regarded slavery as 
more important than peace or human life. They preferred 
that war, devastation, and bloodshed should continue, rather 
than to loose their grasp upon their fellow men. And the 
flames of war were again lighted up. Our army was again 
put in motion. The Indians became desperate. The blood of 
defenceless women and children again flowed, in order that the 
white people might seize and enslave the negroes associated 
with the Indians. I am led to believe, from a careful examina- 
tion of the documents, that General Jessup was unable to pro- 
tect the negroes connected with the Indians, agreeably to his 
covenant. The war became, in fact, a war between this nation 
and the negroes ; for they controlled the Indians. Being una- 
ble to subdue them, General Jessup, finding his troops falling a 
prey to the unhealthy climate in which he was situated, the 
citizens being murdered, their habitations burned, and his army 
discouraged, issued the order No. 1G0, to which I will now call 
the attention of the committee. That part to which I particu- 
larly refer is in the following words : 

" All Indian property captured from this date will belong to the corps or 
detachment making it." 

The sense in which the term property was used in this order 
is fully explained in a letter of General Jessup to Colonel War- 
ren, dated a few days subsequent, in which, speaking of the 
Seminoles, he says : 



THE FLORIDA WAR. 17 

" Their negroes, cattle, and horses, will belong to the corps by which they 
are captured/' 

This order bears date on the 3d of August, 1837, and may 
be found at page 4 of the Documents communicated to this 
House by the Secretary of War on the 27th day of Febru- 
ary, 1839. I think that history will record this as the first 
general order issued by the commander of an American army, 
in which the catching of slaves is held out as an incentive to 
military duty. I mention this fact, and bring it to the consider- 
ation of the committee with feelings of deep mortification. As 
an American, I feel humbled at this act, which cannot be 
viewed by the civilized world otherwise than dishonorable to 
our arms and nation. That this officer, intrusted with the 
command of our army and the honor of our flag, should appeal 
to the cupidity, the desire of plunder, and the worst of human 
passions, in order to stimulate his men to effort, is, I think, to 
be regretted by men of all parties in all sections of our country. 
Our national flag, which floated in proud triumph at Saratoga, 
which was enveloped in a blaze of glory at Monmouth and 
Yorktown, seems to have been prostituted in Florida to the 
base purpose of leading on an organized company of " negro- 
catchers." Sir, no longer is " our country " the battle cry of 
our army in their advance to victory ; but slaves has become 
the watchword to inspire them to effort. No longer does the 
war-worn veteran, amid the battle's rage, think of his country's 
glory, and nerve his arm in behalf of freedom ; but with eagle 
eyes he watches the wavering ranks of the enemy, and as they 
flee before our advancing columns, he plunges among them to 
seize the sable foe and make him his future slave. 

The natural consequence of this order was the capture of a 
large number of negroes. They were mostly taken by two bat- 
talions of Creek Indians, who were then in the employ of our 
government, assisting in this most savage war. 

These colored prisoners had to be guarded to prevent their 

escape. They must also be supplied with food. Their captors 

had none ; and, from necessity, they were supplied from the 

public stores. These circumstances greatly embarrassed the 

2* 



IS THE FLORIDA WAR. 

movements of the army. It became evident, that our officers 
and soldiers could not compete with professed slave-catchers 
unless they could find a market for their victims. Under these 
circumstances the commanding officer issued the general order 
No. 175, dated at Tampa Bay, September 6, 1837. It reads 

as follows : 

" 1. The Seminole negroes captured by the army will be taken on account of 
government, and held subject to the order of the Secretary of War. 

"2. The sum of eight thousand dollars will be paid to the Creek chiefs and 
warriors by whom they were captured, or who were present at the capture, in 
full for their claim to them. 

" 3. To induce the Creek Indians to take alive, and not destroy the negroes 
of citizens who had been captured by the Seminoles, a reward was promised 
them for all they should secure. They captured and secured thirty-five, who 
have been returned to their owners. The owners have paid nothing, but the 
promise to the Indians must be fulfilled. The sum of twenty dollars will be 
allowed to them for each from the public funds. 

" 4. Lieutenant Searle is charged with the execution of this order." 

The documents before me show that this order was approved 
by the honorable Secretary of War on the 7th October follow- 
ing. Thus, Sir, the people of this mighty nation, through the 
efforts of their accredited officers, became the purchasers of 
slaves. They paid eight thousand dollars for human flesh ; 
and we became literally a nation of slave-holders. 

In this manner we have been led on by slave-holding influ- 
ences, step by step, until we find our government and nation 
involved in the crime of holding slaves. The people have been 
kept ignorant of these facts. No solitary voice has been raised 
to inform them of these violations of their rights, of the rights 
of humanity, and of the Constitution ; of this stain upon our 
nation's honor. 

It further appears that the people of the United States, — 
the laborers of Ohio and other free States, — have been com- 
pelled to contribute of their hard earnings to pay a bounty of 
twenty dollars for each negro captured and delivered to the 
white people as a slave.* Among the negroes thus captured 

* It appears, from documents subsequently transmitted to Congress, that 
more than five hundred negroes were captured and delivered over as slaves to 
the white people ; and more than ten thousand dollars were paid from the public 
treasury as a bounty for these barbarous acts. 



THE FLORIDA WAR. 19 

and enslaved were doubtless many, perhaps a majority, who 
were born free. Thus have we been made to contribute our 
money to the purposes of enslaving freemen. 

These flagrant outrages upon humanity have been kept from 
the knowledge of the people. Our public servants have avoided 
the popular odium, by keeping their acts hidden from the pub- 
lic view. 

The Commanding- General appears to have entered into this 
business of catching slaves with a good degree of spirit. In a 
letter dated at Tampa Bay, 25th May,*1837, directed to Lieu- 
tenant-Colonel Harney, General Jessup says: 

"If you see Powel (Oceola) tell him I shall send out and take all the negroes 
who belong to the white people; and he must not allow the Indian negroes to 
mix with them. Tell him I am sending to Cuba for bloodhounds to trail them ; 
and I intend to hang every one of them who does not come in." 

If the negroes had quietly suffered themselves to be trailed 
with bloodhounds, or supinely permitted themselves to be 
hanged for their love of liberty, .they would have deserved the 
name of slaves. 

The expenditure of five thousand dollars for bloodhounds in 
Cuba was not, as has been supposed, for the purpose of trailing 
Indians. In this letter we have it officially announced that they 
were sent for and obtained for the purpose of catching fugitive 
slaves. I desire the people of this nation to understand dis- 
tinctly that they are taxed for the purpose of maintaining and 
supporting slavery in the slave States ; that their treasure has 
been appropriated directly and publicly to that purpose ; that 
our army, many of whose officers and soldiers were bred in the 
free States and in the love of liberty, has been employed, by 
order of the Commanding- General, in pursuing and capturing 
fugitive slaves. Nor is that all. The freemen of the North 
are taxed for the purchase of bloodhounds to act in concert with 
our army in this disgraceful and disgusting mode of conducting 
the war. 

It appears that all the laws of humanity and * of honorable 
warfare were suspended. Colored men were bribed by the 
promise of liberty to turn traitors to their race and to their 



20 THE FLORIDA WAR. 

friends. On the 24th of September, 1837, General Jessup 
wrote the Commissioner of Indian Affairs, saying : 

" The Seminole negroes are now all the property of the public. I have prom- 
ised Abraham the freedom of his family, if he prove faithful to us ; and I shall 
certainly hang him, if he be not faithful." 

I understand that Abraham was taken into the service of the 
army as a pilot to guide them to the negro settlements, in order 
to capture other colored people. If he proved faithful to our 
army, and a traitor to his own people and kindred, he and his 
family were to be free ; *but, if he obeyed the dictates of human- 
ity, and pi;oved faithful to his God, then he was to be hanged ! 
Such, Sir, have been the instrumentalities for conducting this 
war. We shrink from contemplating them, while duty con- 
strains us to make them known to the country. 

Mr. Chairman, in the remarks I have made, it has been my 
object to develop the causes which originally involved us in this 
war, and which occasioned its renewal, as well as to portray to 
the country the manner in which'it has been conducted. In 
discharging this duty, I have relied entirely upon official docu- 
ments. 

The effect which the publication of these facts are to have 
upon the character of those who have conducted the war, is not 
for me to predict. It is due to the truth of history that these 
facts shall go forth to the people ; that the country shall be 
made acquainted with them. But the verdict which civilized 
and Christian nations shall pronounce upon them, and the opin- 
ions which posterity shall form of this war and the manner of 
conducting it, must be recorded by the future historian. 



REDUCTION OF THE ARMY. 



EXCLUSIVE JURISDICTION OF CONGRESS OVER COMMERCE AND NAVIGA- 
TION— SLAVERY LIMITED TO THE JURISDICTION OF THE POWER CRE- 
ATING IT — NO POWERS VESTED IN THE EXECUTIVE BY WHICH HE 
CAN INVOLVE THE PEOPLE OF THE FREE STATES IN THE SUPPORT OF 
THE SLAVE-TRADE — THE RIGHTS OF A REPRESENTATIVE VINDICATED. 

[La 1841, the slave-ship " Creole," sailed from Richmond, Virginia, for New 
Orleans. While at sea, the slaves rose and asserted their liberty. In attempt- 
ing to reduce them to subjection, Hewel, one of the slave-dealers, was killed; 
the others, together with the crew, surrendered the ship to the negroes, who 
guided it to Nassau, in the island of New Providence. Landing them on 
British soil, they at once became free under British laws. The owners of the 
slaves then called on the President of the United States for payment for the 
slaves, and that functionary espoused their cause. Mr. Webster, then Secre- 
tary of State, sent instructions to our Minister at London, directing him to 
demand of the British ministry compensation to the owners of the slaves for 
their losses. This letter of instructions being sent to the Senate, was published 
by order of that body. Mr. Giddings, seeing the influence of our government 
thus prostituted to the support of the slave-trade, introduced to the considera- 
tion of the House of Representatives a series of resolutions denying the consti- 
tutional authority of the President thus to involve the people of the free 
States, or of the nation, in the support of a commerce in the image of God. 
For this he was publicly censured by resolution of the House. He immediately 
resigned his office, and left Congress. His constituents re-elected him, and by 
resolutions instructed him to maintain the doctrines he had asserted. On his 
return to Congress, a proposition to reduce the army came up for considera- 
tion, and was opposed on the ground that a war might grow "but of this transac- 
tion. In reply to these objections, Mr. Giddings made the following remarks. 
Only so much of the speech as had relation to this subject is published in this 
work. It may be proper to add, that this demand on Great Britain has not 
been urged by our government since this opposition in 1842.] 

* Speech upon the bill to reduce the Army. Delivered in Committee of the 
whole House on the state of the Union, June 4, 1842. 



22 REDUCTION OF THE ARMY. 

Mr. Chairman, — The gentleman from Massachusetts, (Mr. 
dishing,) insists that we have a " question of honor with the 
British government, growing out of the Creole question ; " and 
therefore objects to the reduction of the army. I entertain a 
different opinion. I deny that this government either has, or 
can constitutionally have, any thing to do with that transaction. 
The Creole was engaged in the atrocious employment of trans- 
porting slaves. And we cannot honorably lend any encourage- 
ment or support to " that execrable commerce in human flesh." 
Every principle of morality, of national honor, forbids that we 
should lend any aid or assistance to those engaged in a traffic 
in the bodies of men, of women, and of children. If we pros- 
titute our influence in behalf of persons thus engaged, we shall 
dishonor ourselves and the people whom we represent. 

Sir, I would not retain a single soldier in service, to maintain 
this . slave-trade ; on the contrary, I should rejoice if every 
slave shipped from our slave-breeding States could regain his 
liberty, either by the strength of his own arms, or by landing 
on some British island. Instead of maintaining an army to 
sustain this traffic, I would pass laws to punish every man who 
makes merchandise of the image of the Creator. We have 
already enacted laws to punish those who follow the African 
slave-trade. We pronounce them pirates, unworthy of human 
association, and hang them ; but they are far less guilty than 
those who deal in the more enlightened and christianized slaves 
of this American land. No man believes that the crime of 
dealing in human flesh depends upon the latitude or the longi- 
tude in which it is committed ; yet, while we punish with death 
the man who commits this offence on the African coast, our 
President and the Secretary of State are exerting the influence 
of government to aid and encourage those who commit the 
same offence in more a<r2;ravated forms on our own coast. 
Such inconsistency must affect our character with all Christian, 
and even with Mohammedan nations. 

No one denies that Virginia has the power under the Consti- 
tution to hold slaves. It is an institution of her own, with 
which we have no right to interfere. While these owners 



REDUCTION OF THE ARMY. 23 

kept their slaves within that State, they held them in subjection 
under her local laws. While there, the owners could scourge 
them, sell them, or do as they pleased with them. Those laws 
had disrobed the slaves of their manhood ; had taken from 
them the right of self-defence, and subjected them entirely to 
the will of their owners. But the operation of those laws was 
confined to the limits of the State. They could not extend 
into other States, nor upon the high seas. Virginia, by adopt- 
ing the federal Constitution, had surrendered, in definite lan- 
guage, all jurisdiction over the subjects of commerce and navi- 
gation upon the high seas ; and had delegated to Congress the 
sole power to define and punish felonies committed thereon. 
It is, therefore, very obvious, that after the adoption of the 
Constitution, neither Virginia nor any other State held jurisdic- 
tion upon the ocean. Congress alone was authorized to enact 
laws for the government of people on board American ships. 

Holding these principles in view, we see that when the ship 
Creole left the State of Virginia, went beyond the jurisdiction 
of her laws, and entered upon the Atlantic ocean, these slave- 
dealers and their victims could no longer be controlled by the 
local laws of that State. The slave-code had ceased to operate 
upon them ; they were governed by the common law, modified 
by the laws of Congress respecting "commerce and naviga- 
tion." Under those laws, no slavery could exist. 

These persons had originally been seized in their native 
land, torn from their friends and country, and forced on board 
the slave-ship. There, they were held in subjection by means 
of whips and chains. They were then upon the waters of the 
Atlantic, within the jurisdiction of Congress, where no slavery 
existed. They were free in law, although made slaves in fact, 
by the superior intellectual and physical power of their oppres- 
sors. Had they then risen upori their captors, and thrown 
them overboard, or carried them back to Africa, we should 
have rejoiced ; and they would have performed a duty which 
they owed to God and man ; nor would they have offended 
against any laws of the United States, or of any individual State, 
by such summary administration of justice. As yet they were 



24 REDUCTION OF THE ARMY. 

free, and as much entitled to their liberty as when they stood 
upon their native soil. The piratical action of their captors 
had no effect upon their natural or their legal rights. These 
rights were suspended, or rather they were unable to maintain 
them against the brute force which now surrounded them. 
Thus they remained until taken within the jurisdiction of the 
laws of Virginia. There the slave-code threw its penalties 
around them, and they became slaves in law as well as in fact. 
The moment they entered the limits of that State, they came 
under the jurisdiction of laws which took from them the right 
of self-defence ; robbed them of the character of men ; de- 
graded and brutalized them, and rendered them the subjects of 
sale and purchase, like swine in the market. I do not say that 
those laws were less criminal than the action of the slave- 
merchants. Nor do I suppose them to have jplaced these slaves 
under the least moral obligation to obey their masters. On the 
contrary, I suppose that at no moment of time from their first 
seizure in Africa, until their restoration to freedom, were they 
under any moral obligation to obey their oppressors, or the 
laws which held them in degradation ; and if they had at any 
moment possessed the power of releasing themselves from 
bondage, it would have been just and right and proper for them 
to do so, at any expense of life and treasure to those who 
opposed their freedom. This moral right was, therefore, never 
suspended, although the power of exerting it was taken from 
them for years. 

But, Sir, who will deny that these people were reinvested 
with their legal right to liberty when taken back upon the high 
seas, beyond the jurisdiction of "the slave laws under which 
they had suffered ? Those laws could, extend no farther than 
the limits of that State. They had no force or effect upon the 
broad ocean. There, I repeat, the laws of Congress alone bear 
rule. There freedom, and not slavery, prevails ; and the moment 
the ship passed the line which separates the State from the 
high seas, the chains of these people fell from their limbs ; 
the bars of their prison were broken ; they were free ; they 
again became men, clothed with the attributes with which nature 



REDUCTION OF THE ARMY. 25 

and nature's God " has endowed all men ; " they again owned 
their bodies ; they again came into possession of themselves — 
of their intellects ; they again assumed a position among men, 
and were no longer chattels. 

I am aware that the expression of these views is not agree- 
able to the feelings of those around me ; but no member will 
deny their correctness. They are also in direct conflict with 
the letter of instructions from the Secretary of State to our 
minister at London. I entertain the belief, that when that let- 
ter was written, the author did not anticipate that it would 
undergo a public examination in this body. I do not think the 
principles it maintains were well considered. We have so 
long been accustomed to submit silently to these encroachments 
of the Slave-Power, that it is generally expected we shall con- 
tinue to submit. Indeed, we have recently seen a very distinct 
expression of that opinion by this body. It has been thought 
the duty of members here to remain silent when the Executive 
was prostituting the influence of our nation to encourage this 
slave-trade, thereby involving the people of the free States in 
the disgrace of that traffic. I entertain a different view of our 
obligations. I think it our duty to speak frankly our own sen- 
timents, and the sentiments of our people. Our mission here 
is to maintain truth, to uphold justice, and support the constitu- 
tional rights of each portion of the Union. 

It would be a violation of duty for us to sit silently here, and 
permit the President to involve our constituents in the crimes 
of these slave-dealers. The people whom I represent, are 
unwilling to be made parties to this purchase and sale of men. 
We believe it impossible for us to degrade and brutalize any 
portion of mankind without experiencing a recoil of the evils 
we inflict upon others. The misery and suffering imposed upon 
the slaves of this nation, has in a degree paralyzed the physical 
energies and the moral sensibilities of a portion of our white 
population ; thereby retarding our progress in the development 
of our physical and intellectual resources as a people. Feeble- 
ness, vice, and pauperism prevail wherever slavery exists. We 
may as well offend against the laws of our physical nature, as 

3 



26 REDUCTION OF THE ARMY. 

against those of our moral being. We may as well put our 
hands into the fire, with the expectation that they will not be 
burned, as to commit crime with the expectation of impunity. 
The penalty is just as inseparable from the transgression in 
one case, as it is in the other. The idea that oppression, injus- 
tice, and slavery can be perpetrated upon our fellow men, with- 
out inflicting their penalty upon the offenders, was entertained 
by an ignorant, a barbarous age ; but it is inconsistent with the 
philosophy, the ethics of the nineteenth century. 

The Secretary, in his letter of instructions, assumes the pro- 
tection of this commerce in mankind as one of the duties of our 
federal government. With all due respect to that high officer, 
I must dissent from that doctrine. I protest against it. No 
such duty is enjoined upon us by the Constitution. You may 
search that instrument in vain for such obligation, or for any 
authority to exert the power or influence of the nation in behalf 
of the slave-trade. Will any member of this body, or any intel- 
ligent elector of the nation, assert that our Constitution was 
adopted for such a purpose, or that it gives such authority ? 

Did Franklin, or Madison, or Sherman, or Gerry, or any of 
those patriots who framed that charter of American liberty, 
intend, or expect the powers of this nation to be exerted in 
favor of a commerce in our own species ? Such an imputation 
would be a libel upon their memories. 

As I have already shown, these persons, being upon the 
broad ocean, beyond the jurisdiction of all slave laws, were free. 
They were free in law and free in fact ; entitled to our protec- 
tion, for they were under the American flag. While in this 
condition, these slave-dealers attempted to carry them to New 
Orleans, to re-enslave, degrade, and brutalize them ; to sell 
them like swine in the market. Were they then under moral 
obligations to fold their arms and supinely surrender themselves 
victims to their oppressors ? They had the same legal and the 
same moral right to carry their former owners to Africa, and 
sell them as slaves, as those owners had to carry them to the 
barracoons of New Orleans. Quondam owners and quondam 
slaves stood upon the same level, entitled to the same rights, 



REDUCTION OF THE ARMY. 27 

and subject to the same laws, which deal equal justice to all 
under their jurisdiction. 

When, therefore, the slave-dealers attempted to hold the 
negroes in subjection, to carry them by force to the slave-mar- 
kets of Louisiana, they committed an act of piracy ; they 
became pirates in law and in fact. And, I ask, why did the 
President espouse their cause? Why did the Secretary of 
State consent to act as the agent of these pirates ? Why did 
he demand of Great Britain payment for the bodies of these 
freemen ? Neither the British government, nor the people of 
England had gained any pecuniary benefit by the freedom of 
these persons. The negroes secured their liberty, and were the 
only persons benefited. Why then should this nation demand 
from the people of England compensation for their liberty ? 
Why was this demand made after the slaves had been volunta- 
rily emancipated by their owners, in taking them without the 
jurisdiction of slave laws ? Was not that demand undignified 
and wrong, I will not say absurd and ridiculous ? Those terms 
would not be respectful towards the officer who made the 
demand. 

But the error of the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. 
dishing) consists in supposing it our duty to sustain the claim 
of these slave-dealers. If we are under obligation to sustain 
them in their vocation, it follows that we are bound to do it, 
even at the expense of war ; and we should therefore prepare 
for hostilities ; we should increase the army. 

I assure gentlemen, that the people I represent have no 
intention to shed their blood in defence of this slave-trade. 
They would far rather hang every pirate who deals in human 
flesh upon our coast, than go to war,for their protection ! They 
deny most distinctly and emphatically that they are bound to 
hazard their lives, or spend their treasure, or stain their moral 
character, by supporting that commerce in mankind which has 
long disgraced our nation. They know that the President and 
Secretary of State have overstepped the limits of their consti- 
tutional authority ; that the character of the nation has suffered 
from this unauthorized attempt to extort money from the peo- 



28 REDUCTION OF THE ARMY. 

pie of England to compensate these slave-merchants for the 
loss of their " human chattels ; " they discard and repudiate 
this action of the President and of the Secretary of State ; they 
now, and at all times, insist upon their right to be entirely 
exempt from the crimes and disgrace of the slave-trade ; they 
believe it our solemn duty to pass laws for the punishment of 
all who thus offend against the dictates of humanity ; they 
regard the crime of dealing in slaves to be one of the most 
revolting character, and that it should be punished by the 
severest penalty known to human laws. And, I have no 
doubt, that the passage of a bill of that description would be 
far more acceptable to the popular mind than any action of 
government in favor of the slave-trade. 

But the honorable Secretary of State, speaking of these peo- 
ple in his instructions to our minister at London, refers to them 
as guilty of " mutiny and murder" Had he made demand of 
them as murderers or mutineers, the British government would, 
in all probability, have surrendered them, in order that they 
might suffer the penalty attached to those crimes under our 
laws. But he has made no such demand. He merely demands 
pay in dollars and cents for their blood and bones, their mus- 
cles and sinews. His zeal and anxiety is on behalf of the 
slave-dealers, not of justice. He demands pay, not punishment. 
And the question very naturally arises, Why did that officer 
attempt to stigmatize those people as guilty of " mutiny and 
murder ? " If true, it would not strengthen the claims of these 
pretended owners. Their claim would not be made stronger 
by the guilt of their victims. 

I would not judge harshly of any man ; but to me it looks 
very much as though the honorable Secretary was willing to 
divert public attention from his position as agent and solicitor 
for these slave-merchants, by exciting popular indignation 
against those victims of oppression. He appears to think that 
the mass of people will draw no distinction between mutiny and 
the refusal of these persons to obey the slave-dealers. 

No man better understands the definition of " mutiny " than 
the honorable Secretary of State. It is said to be " the resist- 



REDUCTION OF THE ARMY. 29 

ance of legal authority to which the mutineer has voluntarily 
become subject." Thus, a soldier, having voluntarily entered 
the army, enlisted, and become subject to the rules and regu- 
lations of the service, would be guilty of that offence, if he 
resist the lawful commands of his officer. But, Sir, if you or I 
were unlawfully taken by force, against our will, to an encamp- 
ment, and an officer should attempt to control our movements, 
or inflict punishment upon us for disobedience to his command, 
we may lawfully resist such attempt ; and such resistance will 
constitute no crime or offence. 

So, also, if a man enter a ship as a sailor, having signed the 
ship's articles, and submitted voluntarily to the laws and regula- 
tions which govern those employed in that capacity, he thereby 
becomes bound to obey all legal orders of his captain and other 
officers, and resistance to such orders would be mutiny. But, 
Sir, if the same man were unlawfully and by force taken on 
board such ship against his will, no person could urge that he 
was bound to obey the captain, or that resistance to the cap- 
tain's authority would be mutiny. I have stated, and, I think, 
demonstrated, to the satisfaction of those who heard me, that 
these men stood upon the deck of the Creole freemen, released 
and fully emancipated from slavery. While in this situation, 
the captain and former owners were taking them to New 
Orleans to re-enslave and to sell them. And the question 
arises, had they a lawful right to resist this attempt of the 
slave-dealers ? Did resistance to those dealers in human flesh 
constitute " mutiny " ? Will the honorable Secretary, will any 
jurist or lawyer avow such doctrine ? I think not. They will, 
perhaps, speak of it as " mutiny ; " refer to it as such ; but they 
will never appear before this or any other public body, and 
attempt gravely to maintain such doctrine by reason or argu- 
ment. 

Again, the honorable Secretary refers to these persons as 
" murderers." He, Sir, is an eminent lawyer. He understands 
well the definition of that crime. The first book almost which 
was put into his hands, as a student of that profession, taught 
him that, — 

3* 



30 REDUCTION OF THE- ARMY. 

" Murder, is the killing of a reasonable being in the public peace, without 
wan-ant or excuse, and with rnalice aforethought." 

These persons had suffered the horrors of slavery under the 
laws of Virginia. While in that State, the whole power of that 
commonwealth had been arrayed against them, to hold them in 
bondage. At length their owners carried them beyond the 
jurisdiction of those slave-laws. They were upon the high seas, 
subject only to the laws of Congress. These piratical dealers 
held them in subjection without law, and in violation of justice 
and the dictates of humanity. In the spirit and dignity of their 
manhood, they rose and asserted the rights with which the God 
of nature had endowed them. The slave-dealer (Hewell) 
thrust himself between them and their freedom, and attempted 
to disrobe them of the liberty which God had given them, and 
to subject them to his will. They defended their lives and 
their liberty. They slew him, for which you and I and all 
mankind honor them. We applaud their heroism. The whole 
civilized world will say they did right. Not a slave-holder pre- 
sent will say they did wrong. Would the honorable Secretary, 
in their situation, have done less ? Would he, with a craven 
heart and a dastardly soul, have quietly submitted to be carried 
to the barracoons of New Orleans, and sold like a beast of bur- 
den ? If so, he would not have deserved the name of man. 
They possessed no moral right to surrender the liberty of them- 
selves and offspring in all coming time ; to doom their descend- 
ants to sighs and chains, and tears and suffering. 

Yet, the Secretary calls this heroic, this high imperative duty 
" murder I " Epithets are of little importance. We may use 
language in various ways ; but this appears to me as great an 
abuse of our native English as any I have met. Had these 
persons no " warrant," no excuse, for defending their lives and 
their liberties ? Was Hewell in the observance of the public 
peace when attempting to slay them for asserting their liberty ? 
Did they exhibit malice in thus protecting themselves against 
the attacks of a man who was pursuing a vocation hated of 
man and cursed of God ? 

Sir, I will not pursue the subject farther. The Secretary of 



REDUCTION OF THE ARMY. 31 

State has mistaken the objects for which this government was 
instituted. Our patriot fathers, who proclaimed our independ- 
ence, declared that " governments are instituted among men, to 
secure to all the enjoyment of life, liberty, and the pursuit of 
happiness." But the honorable Secretary appears to think its 
principal design is to secure slave-dealers in the pursuit of their 
execrable vocation. 

Sir, the doctrines advanced by the Secretary of State are 
unworthy of the reputation he sustains, or the position he holds. 
They are in conflict with the spirit of the age in which we live, 
and of the religion we profess ; they are opposed to the Consti- 
tution, and to the humane promptings of our nature ; they are 
hostile to the popular sentiment, and to the interest of the peo- 
ple. The people love freedom ; they admire justice ; but they 
hate oppression, and detest crime. 

Yet this bocly is not prepared to oppose the policy, or the 
doctrines of the Secretary of State. The influence of the 
Slave Interest and of Executive power is felt here, and mem- 
bers have become accustomed to act in concert with the admin- 
istration. But our Creator has not left his attributes of truth 
and justice to depend upon the favor of men in high places. 
Those attributes of Deity are omnipotent. They will prevail. 
When the political strifes around us shall cease ; when the 
Secretary of State and ourselves shall sleep in our graves ; 
when our names shall disappear from the records of time, the 
great, undying truth, " that all men are created equal, that 
they are endowed by their Creator with the inalienable right to 
Life and Liberty," will be acknowledged and observed. In 
the avowal of these views, I have not consulted the feelings or 
the influences with which I am more immediately surrounded. 
I could not do so consistently with the obligations I owe to 
myself and those who shall bear my name in coming time. I 
could not do so with a due regard to the duties which I owe to 
my country and to mankind. 

The maintenance of truth and justice to the extent of our 
power, is an imperative duty from which we cannot be 
excused, although in its discharge, we may be constrained to 
expose political wickedness in high places. 



THE AMERICAN SLAVE-TRADE.* 



LEGISLATIVE STRATEGY TO MAINTAIN IT — ITS CHARACTER — FRAUD PRAC- 
TISED BY OUR MINISTER AT LONDON — CONGRESSIONAL LEGISLATION TO 
ENCOURAGE IT — MORAL RESPONSIBILITY OF LEGISLATORS — RIGHT OF 
THE PEOPLE TO BE EXEMPT FROM ITS CRIMES. 

[This bill, as originally presented, was objectionable to the Mends of liberty. 
To secure its passage, a substitute was presented, and passed by unanimous 
consent. While in the Senate, this substitute, as it passed the House, was 
struck out, and the original bill, in its objectionable form, was substituted, and 
passed that body. When it came back to the House, Mr. Stanley, of North 
Carolina, demanded the previous question, which was sustained, and thus pre- 
vented all amendments, and cut off all debate. Mr. Giddings appealed to him 
to withdraw the demand, that he might state his objections to the bill. Mr. 
Stanley refused. Mr. Giddings then voted for the bill, in order to obtain the 
floor to move a reconsideration of the vote, which he did as soon as it was 
announced. On this motion, he made the following remarks.] 

Mr. Speaker, — I have made the motion to reconsider the 
vote just taken, more for the purpose of calling attention to the 
character of the bill under consideration, than with a hope to 
prevent its passage. 

I also desire to absolve myself, and those whom I represent, 
from all participation in the guilt of legislating for the encour- 
agement of this slave-trade. Should this bill become a law, as 
I presume it will, I desire that the odium of its enactment may 
rest upon gentlemen who are willing to sustain and to vote for 
it ; and not on those who are opposed to it. 

* Speech on the bill to relieve the owners of the slaves lost from on board 
the ships " Comet and Encomium," delivered in the House of Representatives, 
February 13, 1843. 



THE AMERICAN SLAVE-TRADE. 33 

The duty which now devolves upon me, has resulted from 
the action of other gentlemen. I sought to avoid it. I call 
this House and the Country to witness that I have not, at this 
time, nor upon any former occasion, thrust this subject upon 
their consideration. I have at all times acted upon the defen- 
sive. Such is most emphatically the case at this time. 

The history of this claim is briefly this. Some nine years 
since, two slave ships, the " Comet," and the " Encomium," 
sailed for New Orleans ; the one from Alexandria, in this 
District, and the other from Charleston, South Carolina. They 
were both wrecked near the British island of New Providence, 
and the slaves being landed on British soil, became free. The 
slave-dealers applied to the President for payment for their 
losses, who, through our minister at London, demanded compen- 
sation for the loss of those cargoes of human flesh. He obtained 
twenty-five thousand pounds sterling from the British govern- 
ment. This amount, except about seven thousand dollars, was 
paid over by the Secretary of State to those who claimed to 
own the slaves on board those ships. 

As President Van Buren was about to retire from office, his 
Secretary of State, Mr. Forsyth, paid over the money which 
remained in his hands, to the treasurer of the United States, and 
took a receipt therefor. 

During the past year, other claimants appeared for this 
balance, and the Treasurer refused to pay them, until author- 
ized by act of Congress. They then applied to this House, 
and the Committee on Ways and Means, through their chair- 
man, (Mr. Fillmore,) reported a bill authorizing the payment 
of this money to these claimants. Seeing this bill upon my 
table, I examined the subject so far as to satisfy myself that the 
whole proceeding of the Executive, and of our Minister at the 
Court of St. James, was unauthorized by the Constitution, a 
violation of moral principle, and derogatory to the character of 
the United States. I therefore determined to oppose its pas- 
sage. It came up for consideration twice on those days when 
no bill can, under our rules, pass, if objection be made., I 
objected to its consideration. The gentleman who reported it, 



34 THE AMERICAN SLAVE-TRADE. 

(Mr. Fillmore,) personally appealed to me to let it pass. I 
assured him that my objections were substantial, and that I 
could never consent to legislate for the benefit of those whose 
vocation is to traffic in our own species. 

The gentleman from North Carolina (Mr. Stanley) came to 
my seat, requesting me to withdraw my objections, and 
appeared to think it unkind for me to prevent the passage of 
the bill. Anxious to satisfy him and all others that I was 
governed by principles which I deemed important, I told him, 
that while I would not consent to legislate for the benefit of 
those who deal in the bodies of mankind, I would cheerfully 
consent that the money should be returned to the Secretary of 
State, or to the President, leaving them to pay it out to whom- 
soever they pleased. 

An amendment was thereupon drawn up, simply authorizing 
the Secretary of State to withdraw the money. This amend- 
ment would have prevented any discussion of this slave-deal- 
ing transaction, into which I am now unexpectedly drawn with- 
out one moment's preparation. The gentleman consulted with 
his colleagues, and agreed to the amendment, which was 
adopted by the House ; and without further objection the bill 
passed this body. I supposed him to be acting in good faith, 
and entertained no suspicion that he was governed by less 
liberality and candor than I myself exercised. But for his 
apparent satisfaction, I should have continued my objection, 
and defeated the bill, at least for the present session ; or, had 
it come up for discussion in committee, I would have had the 
privilege of expressing my views upon it. It went to the 
Senate, where it was amended by striking out the whole bill as 
it passed this body, and inserting the original as reported by 
the committee of this House, and then sent back to us for con- 
currence. 

It came up this morning, upon the question of agreeing to 
the amendment of the Senate. The gentleman (Mr. Stanley) 
being upon the watch, obtained the floor, and after stating that 
the money belonged to the claimants, and that no member had 
objections to its passage except myself, who, he said, enter- 



THE AMERICAN SLAVE-TRADE. 35 

tained " peculiar views on the subject," he demanded the " pre- 
vious question," which cut off debate, and brought the House 
to a final vote on the bill. It was in vain that I appealed to 
him to withdraw his demand, and permit me to state my objec- 
tions. This he refused, and has thereby forfeited all claim to 
that courtesy which I supposed him to possess. I voted in the 
affirmative on agreeing to the Senate's amendment, for the pur- 
pose of moving a reconsideration of the vote, and thereby 
have obtained possession of the floor by a sort of legislative 
stratagem, which I would not have practised under other cir- 
cumstances. Having now legitimate occupancy of the floor, I 
will take occasion to say, that the gentleman from North Caro- 
lina (Mr. Stanley) was not authorized to express my views, 
either as peculiar to myself, or as common with others. I, Sir, 
have never constituted him the exponent of my sentiments. I 
usually speak for myself ; and if he intended to say that I am 
the only member opposed to this bill, he states that which he 
was not authorized to assert. Other gentlemen were anxious 
to state their objections ; but his adroitness in demanding the 
previous question, cut them off from this ordinary privilege in 
legislation. 

I mention these facts to justify myself before the country, 
and to inform the people of the legerdemain, the tricks made 
use of by slave-holders to prevent exposure of the iniquities 
which attend their cherished institution. I will now proceed 
to the examination of the bill. 

We are called on to interpose our legislative powers in aid 
of certain individuals of this city and of South Carolina, who, 
in 1831, entered into a commercial speculation in the bodies of 
men, women, and children. Many of them were born here 
under our laws, and were entitled by every principle of human- 
ity to our protection. Here, Sir, in view of this hall, under 
the shadow of " the star-spangled banner " which floats over 
this edifice, consecrated to freedom, to the maintenance of the 
undying truth " that governments are instituted to secure all 
men in the enjoyment of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happi- 
ness," these hucksterers in human flesh critically examined the 



36 THE AMERICAN SLAVE-TRADE. 

bodies and limbs, and judged of the age, the qualities, and mar- 
ketable value of fathers, mothers, sisters, brothers, and child- 
ren. I doubt whether any slave-market in Africa was ever 
attended by more expert dealers in human chattels, than was 
the market of this city, which profanes the name of Washing- 
ton. But, Sir, their victims were born and bred under our 
laws for this very purpose. This city, and the surrounding 
country, had been familiar to them from their earliest recollec- 
tion ; here were the scenes of their childhood, to which they 
had become attached ; here they had formed their associations ; 
in our churches they had listened to the preaching of the 
gospel, and there they had been admitted to church fellow- 
ship ; and there they had partaken of the holy communion, as 
members of our various Christian denominations. Such were 
the people whose bodies were made merchandise under our 
laws. Such were the people purchased by those slave-dealers, 
who now ask us to aid them in carrying out their speculations 
in the bodies of Presbyterians, Baptists, Methodists, and Epis- 
copalians. 

Who shall attempt a description of the separation of these 
people, — the tearing asunder of all the ties of domestic life, — 
the brother taken and the sister left, — the parent forced from 
her weeping children, — the shrieking wife forced away from 
her frantic husband and family ? 

I judge not for others ; but I would as soon have united in 
that speculation, and shared in the crimes of those purchases, 
and the scenes to which I refer, as I would encourage those 
iniquities, by legislating for the benefit of those who committed 
them. 

But this come of native-born Americans was marched to yon- 
der wharf. There lay the ship " Comet," ready to receive her 
cargo of humanity. Her manifest was made out and signed by 
the proper officer. Those people cast a last, long, lingering 
look, and bade a final farewell to the scenes of their childhood 
and youth, and to all they held dear in this world. We, Sir, 
were in our places in this hall, bland and smiling as a summer's 
morning. The unutterable horror which rested upon those sad 



THE AMERICAN SLAVE-TRADE. 37 

hearts did not oppress us. The pangs which tortured their 
souls did not disturb our enjoyments. But we are now asked 
to participate in that guilt, by passing this bill ; and, methinks, 
if we will but listen, we may hear the sighs and groans of those 
victims of oppression. 

I am unable to say, with precision, what we were doing when 
those objects of congressional barbarity bade a lasting farewell 
to the proud dome which towers above us. Probably, some 
member was expatiating upon the " inalienable rights of man ; " 
upon that " largest liberty" of which we hear so much. Or, 
perad venture, some slave-holding member was demonstrating to 
this body that Congress possesses no right to interfere with this 
slave-trade, which is upheld and sustained by laws of our own 
enactment, and which we are now asked to encourage, by pass- 
ing the bill before us. Whatever we were engaged in, these 
people were taken on board the " Comet," at a port in this dis- 
trict, under the exclusive legislation of Congress. The sails 
were unfurled ; and no port upon the savage coast of Africa 
ever sent forth in one ship more sighing and weeping and 
human suffering than was borne from yonder wharf in that 
slave-ship. 

Our laws, — the statutes of Congress, — authorized this sav- 
age barbarity, this perpetration of crime, from the contempla- 
tion of which we shrink with horror. The " Encomium " took 
her departure from Charleston, South Carolina. Her cargo of 
human chattels was purchased and collected under the laws of 
that State, and both ships left the jurisdiction of the local laws 
which authorized the holding of man as property. They entered 
upon the "high seas," where no slavery exists on board Amer- 
ican vessels. These people, therefore, became free in law the 
instant those ships passed beyond the jurisdiction of South Car- 
olina and Virginia. The " Comet," when passing down the 
river, entered within the jurisdiction of Virginia, and her slaves 
were held as such, under Virginia laws, until they passed out 
upon the Atlantic, beyond the jurisdiction of that State. Then 
the people collected here and shipped as slaves became freemen. 
On this point I expressed my views fully in June last, in some 
4 



38 THE AMERICAN SLAVE-TRADE. 

remarks which I then had the honor of making relative to the 
slave-dealers, who claimed to own the people on board the 
" Creole." I will not now repeat that argument. It applies 
with its full force to this bill. All jurists will agree, that the 
moment these ships passed beyond the jurisdiction of State 
laws, and entered upon the " high seas," the shackles fell from 
their limbs, and they were, in the eye of the law, transformed to 
freemen, clothed with all the attributes of American liberty. 

While thus free in view of the law, they were yet held in 
subjection by the superior intelligence of their oppressors, who, 
with the aid of chains and the scourge, held dominion over 
them, intending to carry them to New Orleans for sale. 

While they were thus held in subjection, they were ship- 
wrecked near the British island of New Providence. The 
wreckers carried both them and their former masters to the 
port of Nassau, where they became subject to British laws. An 
overruling Providence had thus conducted them to a British 
island, where their rights were protected. By landing on Brit- 
ish soil, they gained no new right, nor did they thereby become 
possessed of any legal privilege to which they were not enti- 
tled while upon the Atlantic Ocean. But, once on British soil, 
their legal rights were protected by British authority. 

This, Sir, was the misfortune of these piratical slave-mer- 
chants. When they had landed on that island, they became 
subject to law. They were no longer able to trample upon the 
rights of their victims. Chains and whips became useless 
where the law of human rights was in force. They saw their 
" locomotive property " move about with an entire indifference 
to their commands. The British officers would neither seize 
these emancipated slaves, nor furnish bloodhounds to perform 
that task ; but permitted them to go from place to place at the 
dictation of their own wills, without heeding the griefs, or listen- 
ing to the entreaties of their late oppressors. The people who 
had thus become free greatly rejoiced in their liberty, and 
devoutly thanked God for their deliverance from the oppression 
and degradation to which they had been subjected in this land 
of boasted freedom. 



THE AMERICAN SLAVE-TRADE. 39 

Thus closed the voyages of these slave-ships. The slave- 
merchants returned to this city, and called on the President for 
remuneration. They declared, that, inasmuch as the colored 
people carried from this district and from South Carolina would 
not go to New Orleans to be sold like swine in the market, 
therefore the people of England ought to pay for their bodies. 
And it appears that the President was of the same opinion. 
But, be that as it may, he consented to act as the agent of these 
speculators in human flesh ; to use our national influence to 
sustain this traffic in the bodies of native-born Americans. 

Here, Sir, was the point where the Executive transcended 
his constitutional obligations. He had no legitimate nor consti- 
tutional right thus to involve our nation in the support of this 
piracy. He had not been elevated by the people of this great 
Republic to that high office for the purpose of thus disgracing 
the nation in the eyes of the Christian world. That prostitu- 
tion of our national character and influence was unconstitutional, 
and an outrage upon our character as a nation. I expressed 
my views on this point, also, in my remarks upon the " Creole 
case," to which I have heretofore referred. 

I submit to the consideration of gentlemen, whether the time 
has not arrived when the representatives from the free States 
ought to speak frankly and fearlessly on this subject. Is it not 
due to the President, as well as to ourselves, that he should 
hear an expression of the popular feeling on this subject? For, 
Sir, the people of the North are indignant at being thus involved 
in the guilt of this infamous traffic. Gentlemen here from 
the free States are either willing to see their constituents 
and themselves thus subsidized to the support of this " Amerir- 
can piracy," or they are opposed to it. I desire to hear those 
who favor this slave-trade speak out in plain and definite lan- 
guage, and avow their opinions. Let them point us to that 
clause of the Constitution which authorizes the President thus 
to involve the people of the nation in the crimes attendant upon 
this execrable commerce. Why do members sit here in silence ? 
Why so timid and trembling ? Do they distrust the power of 



40 THE AMERICAN SLAVE-TRADE. 

truth ? Do the j tremble before the frown of the slave-holder ? 
Sir, let us be men. Let us maintain the dignity of our man- 
hood, the rights of our people, and the Constitution of our coun- 
try. If gentlemen really feel that our people are bound to 
maintain this slave-trade, are under constitutional obligations 
to go to war and shed their blood, that these pirates may pur- 
sue their vocation, let them say it. If not, let them speak 
against it. If the President were acting in pursuance of his 
constitutional duty, in demanding of Great Britain a compensa- 
tion to these slave-holders, it is unquestionably our duty to sus- 
tain him in that demand, even at the expense of war. But, if 
we are not under such obligation, then has that officer over- 
stepped the bounds of his constitutional authority. No one 
would suppose, that the duty of this government is performed, 
when the President makes a demand in such case, and his 
demand is refused. If it be his duty to encourage and sustain 
the slave-trade, by demanding compensation for slaves, who are 
emancipated in the manner that these were, it would, unques- 
tionably, be our duty to sustain that demand by an appeal to 
arms, if we should fail to obtain indemnity to the slave-dealers 
in any other way. This subject is, therefore, important to the 
people, and to the civilized world. 

Gentlemen may differ in their views ; but I would as soon 
see northern men pierced by British bayonets, while defending 
this slave-trade, as to see them disgraced, by tamely submitting 
to become the instruments for sustaining it. 

But, Sir, the President was not alone in his efforts to involve 
the nation in the odium of this slave-trade. His Secretary of 
State, (Mr. Van Buren,) a northern man, bred in the love of 
liberty, united with the President in this work, gave official 
instructions to our minister at the Court of St. James, and 
brought all the resources of his intellect to the aid of these mis- 
creant dealers in the bodies of men, who were greatly their 
superiors in all that constitutes moral worth. The zealous 
interest which he took in the maintenance of this slave-trade, 
is well expressed in his letter to our minister at London, in 
which he says : 



THE AMERICAN SLAVE-TRADE. 41 

" In the present state of our diplomatic relations with the government of his 
Britannic Majesty, the most immediately pressing of the matters with which 
the United States legation at London is now charged, is the claim of certain 
citizens against Great Britain for a number of slaves, the cargoes of the three 
vessels wrecked in the British islands in the Atlantic." 

We then had a controversy with Great Britain, in regard to 
our north-eastern boundary. In order to protect our interests 
there, soon after the date of this letter, Congress provided, and 
placed at the disposal of the President, ten millions of dollars, 
and gave him power to raise fifty thousand troops. Yet, the 
vast interests at stake in that quarter and in the North-west, 
were all matters of minor consideration, when compared with 
these cargoes. Mark the language of a professed democrat, — 
" cargoes " of women, and " cargoes " of men. This, Sir, is the 
language of him who is considered the very paragon of north- 
ern democracy ; who is destined, by the magic of his influence, 
to prostrate the political aspirations of the talented favorite of 
the democrats of the South. Sir, will our democratic friends 
at the North, those who, with the patriots of '76, hold that "all 
men are created, equal" consider this language, this servile 
truckling to the slave-breeding interests, as a sufficient passport 
to their favor ? 

Another gentleman acted somewhat conspicuously in this 
negotiation. He, Sir, was bred in the " Old Dominion," where, 
to use the words of one of her most talented sons, " men are 
reared for the market like oxen for the shambles" It was, there- 
fore, expected that he would bring to the discharge of his duties, 
as assistant agent, resident in London, all the zeal and devotion 
which subsequently characterized his efforts to subserve the 
interests of his employers. I refer to Andrew Stevenson, our 
late minister at the Court of St. James. But, Sir, I speak of 
him and the others as agents for these slave-merchants, for the 
reason that they acted as such. When thus acting, without 
any constitutional authority, they were to be regarded as acting 
in their individual characters, and not as public officers. Had 
they, or either of them, undertaken to act as the commission 
agent or broker for any other band of pirates than those who 
avowed themselves such, no one would have regarded their acts 
4* 



42 THE AMERICAN SLAVE-TRADE. 

as binding upon this nation or the people of these United States ; 
yet they possessed the same authority to prostitute our charac- 
ter to the support of any other piratical transaction, as they 
had to involve this nation in a commerce that we ourselves and 
the whole Christian world denounce as 'piracy. 

I crave the attention of the friends of Mr. Stevenson. I hope 
and trust they will not fail to do all in their power to sustain 
the accuracy of his official assertions. In his letter to Lord 
Palmerston of December, 1836, speaking of this claim for 
slaves, he says : 

" The undersigned feels assured, that it will only be necessary to refer Lord 
Palmerston to the provisions of the Constitution of the United States, and the 
laws of many of the States, to satisfy him of the existence of slavery, and that 
slaves are regarded and protected as property ; that, by these laws, there is, in 
fact, no distinction in principle between property in persons and property in 
tilings; and that the government have more than once, in the most solemn 
manner, determined that slaves killed in the service of the United States, even 
in a state of war, were to be regarded as property, and not as persons, and the 
government held responsible for their value." 

Now, Sir, if there be an instance in which this House has 
acknowledged slaves to be property, Mr. Stevenson and his 
friends can show us the record. If this body, or Congress, in 
any instance, from the formation of the government to this day, 
has determined " that slaves killed in the public service, in time 
of war, [or in time of peace,] were to he regarded as property, 
and the government held responsible for their value" the friends 
of that gentleman, after corresponding with him, and having 
full time to examine the subject, can refer us to such case ; can 
show us the record of its passage. As chairman of the Com- 
mittee on Claims, it became my official duty, long since, to 
examine this subject. I did so carefully and thoroughly ; and, 
I hesitate not to declare, that no such record exists ; that the 
records of this body and of the Treasury Department show this 
assertion of our minister at London to be unfounded and untrue. 
These records show, that, in every instance where application 
for such payment was made, the claim has been refused. I, 
therefore, say to the people of the nation, and to the British 
ministry, that this assertion of Mr. Stevenson was deceptive 



THE AMERICAN SLAVE-TRADE. 43 

and fraudulent ; that this money, which we are now called on 
to pay over to these slave-dealers, was obtained from the peo- 
ple of England by "fraudulent pretences" 

The British ministers could not be supposed to understand 
the action of our government, in regard to the payment for 
slaves. They had a right to expect the assertions of the Amer- 
ican minister to be correct and truthful. Relying upon his 
statements, they concluded to deal with Americans, as in former 
times they dealt with Algerines, — to pay an extravagant 
ransom for those people ; and the sum of seventy -five thousand 
dollars was therefore paid over and transmitted to the honora- 
ble Secretary of State. These funds were not placed at the 
disposal of Congress, neither were they paid into the Treasury 
of the United States. The whole transaction was managed by 
the Executive. He received the money, instituted the inquiry 
as to those who claimed to be the owners of the slaves, and 
paid to each his portion. In all this, he acted independently of 
Congress. He made no report of his doings. In truth, the 
people were ignorant of the whole matter ; nor were we, the 
representatives of the people, consulted. The money was 
mostly paid over to the claimants ; but when Mr. Van Buren 
and his cabinet were about to retire from office, the Secretary 
of State had in his possession some seven thousand dollars of 
the money thus extorted by fraud and misrepresentation from 
the British government. Mr. Van Buren, not having fully 
completed the business in which he had been so long engaged 
as the representative of slave merchants, bequeathed to William 
Selden, treasurer of the United States, the trust of closing the 
transaction. The money was paid to him, and a receipt taken. 
This was done without any authority of law whatever ; and the 
treasurer might have paid it to the slave-owners, by virtue of 
the same authority as that by which he received it. The veri- 
est tyro in law will at once see that it is not in the power of 
every man who pleases, to charge the government with moneys, 
by making a deposit with the treasurer, unless it be authorized 
by law ; no such law existed in this case, and the only legal 
effect was to make the treasurer liable in his individual capac- 



44 THE AMERICAN SLAVE-TRADE. 

ity, as trustee of the persons who possess the real interest in 
the money. Now, I think it perfectly clear, that no action 
whatever of Congress was necessary to authorize the with- 
drawal of this money from the Treasury. In contemplation of 
law, it had never been there, but was in the private custody of 
Mr. Selden. Yet, we are called on now to close up this slave- 
dealing agency by a solemn act of Congress ; thereby making 
ourselves and constituents participants in the fraud, the moral 
turpitude, and the crime that have characterised this transac- 
tion, from the purchase of these cargoes, up to the time of pay- 
ing the money to Mr. Selden. I can see but one object in press- 
ing this law upon the consideration of this body. Its passage 
will involve us in the odium which the President, Secretary of 
State, and our minister to London have brought upon them- 
selves. It will make us share the disgrace with them. To 
such action I object. 

For many years, the people of the free States have endeav- 
ored to relieve the nation from the deep odium resting upon it 
by reason of this slave-trade. For that purpose they have sent 
to us their petitions, couched in the most respectful language, 
asking that it may be prohibited, under suitable penalties. And 
what treatment have these freemen — these supporters of our 
national character — met in this hall? Why, Sir, they have- 
been assailed with almost every opprobrious epithet which our 
language could supply. Their petitions have been scouted 
from our presence without being read, or heard, or even 
received at the hands of their representatives. I myself have 
presented the requests of thousands of our most worthy citi- 
zens, — of our philanthropists, our divines, our jurists, and 
statesmen, — invoking the action of this body against this slave- 
trade, praying that it might be prohibited under the same pen- 
alties which are attached to like crimes when committed on 
the African coast. But, Sir, if I happened to cast my eye 
upon the petition, or assumed the appearance of reading it, 
cries of order, order, order, would be shouted from the mouths 
of scores of slave-holders and overseers. 

Sir, what magic wand has been waved over us, that we now 



THE AMERICAN SLAVE-TRADE. 45 

sit so quietly deliberating upon this bill to encourage the slave- 
trade ; or rather, why do we now pass this bill without deliber- 
ation ? Shall we turn round at the bidding of this slave- 
dealing influence, and quietly submit to do the bidding of our 
southern masters ? Sir, Lfeel humbled, deeply humbled, when 
I cast my eyes around this hall, and see representatives of the 
free States sitting in mute silence, and aiding by their vote the 
passage of a bill shamelessly bearing on its title the character 
of a bill for the relief of slave-traders. What power has thus 
miraculously silenced the voice of northern freedom and north- 
ern honor ? What spell has now palsied the arms which should 
defend the rights and interests of the free States ? Shall we 
now submit, and meanly assist in carrying out this attempt to 
involve ourselves, and our constituents, in the disgrace of the 
slave-trade ? Wherewith shall we humble ourselves before 
those who claim this control over us ? Where shall we find 
sackcloth with which to cover our bodies, or ashes to cast upon 
our heads, while, with downcast eyes and trembling voices, we 
give a response disgraceful to those whom we represent ? Sir, 
the trembling slave, who dares not look up in the presence of 
his tyrant master, has some excuse for his degradation ; but I 
can find no justification whatever for northern men, — the repre- 
sentatives of freemen, — who thus tamely surrender the rights 
and the honor of their constituents, and become the willing 
instruments for carrying on and sustaining this detestable com- 
merce in slaves. 

Sir, I have a curiosity to witness the response of members to 
the question which will soon be propounded, to see how many 
will now vote in favor of this bill, who, for years, have regu- 
larly voted to gag their own constituents upon this identical 
subject. If I were to suggest a subject for the pencil, it should 
be the one on which I am now commenting. I would select a 
northern democrat, holding a gag in the mouth of his constitu- 
ent with one hand, while the other is employed to examine his 
pockets for money to pay the expenses of this slave agency ; at 
the same time most solemnly saying to his constituent, "you 



46 THE AMERICAN SLAVE-TRADE. 

have nothing to do with the slave-trade" "you have no right to 
interfere with the matter." 

I regret being forced into these remarks. I have made 
every effort to avoid it which duty and independence would 
permit ; but, notwithstanding my exertions for that purpose, I 
have been driven to it, and I trust that gentlemen will excuse 
me if I speak frankly. The subject of slavery, or of the 
slave-trade, never ought to have been mentioned in this hall. 
Accursed be the memory of him who first profaned this temple 
of freedom with the discussion of slavery and the slave-trade. 
Let the execrations of posterity rest upon those who involved 
the national government in these subjects, by enacting laws for 
the support of slavery. But we have become involved in these 
questions ; and it shall be my object now, and at all times, to 
correct the error into which we have fallen. I will use my 
utmost exertions to banish it from our deliberations ; to erase 
these laws from our records ; to separate the people of the free 
States and this government from slavery ; and to place an 
impassable gulf between our people of the free States and an 
institution which we detest. It was this desire which led me 
to consent to the arrangement by which these persons might 
have obtained this money, without involving us in their guilt 
and disgrace. 

Yet, Sir, this bill is thrust upon us ; not, however, with the 
intention of discussing it, but for the purpose of forcing us to 
pass it without discussion, and without investigating its merits. 
"We are asked to sustain it without examination ; and if we 
refuse to do that, it is to be forced upon us by means of the 
previous question. This want of examination, and consequent 
ignorance of the bill, is one reason why we ought not to vote 
for its passage. 

Sir, self-respect, a proper regard to consistency, forbids the 
passage of this bill. We, Sir, by former statutes have declared 
the slave-trade upon the African coast to be piracy, and have 
affixed to it the highest penalty known to human laws. We 
hang those who deal in slaves on that coast, as unfit for human 



THE AMERICAN SLAVE-TRADE. 47 

association. But, the offence of the persons who now seek our 
aid is greater than is that of men who deal in African slaves. 
People born here, in the midst of civilized life, who have 
attained some knowledge of their rights, who have been taught 
their own immortality, and feel the dignity of manhood stirring 
within them, suffer far more keenly under the degradation which 
the slave-trade subjects them to, than do their more ignorant 
and stupid brethren of Africa. It is more shocking to the feelings 
of bur people to see Christians buy and sell those who worship 
the same God, trust in the same Redeemer, rely upon the 
same salvation as ourselves, than it is to see them deal in the 
savages of a heathen land. I do not say that the iniquity is 
really greater, but I insist that it is more abhorrent to the 
popular feeling. But, Sir, while we hang men for dealing in 
slaves on the African coast, we are called to aid those who 
commit the same crimes on the American coast. This is inex- 
cusable. The character of crime is not modified by the longi- 
tude in which it is committed. God views this buying and 
selling of his image with the same detestation, whether prac- 
tised on the eastern or the western shores of the Atlantic. 
And, Sir, we ought to deal out justice with an even hand. 
Those slave-dealers, for whose benefit we are asked to pass this 
bill, are more deserving the halter at our hands, than they are 
pecuniary encouragement. 

We expend a vast amount of the people's money annually, 
to suppress the slave-trade in Africa ; while we are called on 
to pass this bill to sustain and encourage the committing of the 
same crimes here in our midst. Will gentlemen vote to en- 
courage this traffic to-day, and then turn round to-morrow and 
vote millions from the public treasure to suppress it ? Have we 
not sufficient regard to the reputation of Congress to avoid 
such tergiversation ? 

Sir, this bill provides that the treasurer shall pay this money 
to the owners of those people ! What is to be the evidence 
which shall entitle one man to hold another as property ? The 
proposition is of itself an absurdity too palpable to require 
exposure. What authority has our Creator given these slave- 



48 THE AMERICAN SLAVE-TRADE. 

dealers to hold in degrading servitude men who are in every 
accomplishment which constitutes moral worth, their superiors ? 
The only title which any man ever had to his fellow-man is 
that of power, of brute force. It is the same title which the 
robber has to your purse ; or the pirate to his captured ship, 
and the victims on board. The people whom I represent, repu- 
diate such claims. I detest them. 

But the bill goes further, and directs the treasurer to pay to 
the owners of each slave " such sum as he is entitled* to 
receive." By this form of expression, I suppose it was intended 
to give to each the value of the person claimed. How will 
you estimate the value of a man ? Does it depend upon his 
complexion ? for, Sir, there are all grades of color in this mar- 
ket. Or which is deemed the most valuable, — black or white, 
or a mixture of both ? Or shall our officer be governed by the 
genealogy of the slave in estimating its value? If he have 
descended in the paternal line from one of the best families in 
the " Old Dominion," shall he be deemed of greater value than 
though he were of pure African blood ? Does such mixture 
improve or deteriorate the value of a man ? These, Sir, are, all 
of them, "delicate questio7is" which I should like to hear 
answered by some of the friends of this bill. Again : some 
may desire to know whether intelligence is to fix the value ? Is 
a man who reads and writes, and possesses better information 
than his master, or than masters generally possess, of more 
value than one who is stupid, ignorant, and incapable of 
instructing his owner ? And, Sir, others may wish to know 
what the political faith of a man is, before they fix his value. 
They will inquire whether he be a whig, or a democrat, or an 
advocate of freedom ? Others will inquire to what religious 
sect he belongs ? and which sells the highest in market, Pres- 
byterians, Methodists, Quakers, Baptists, or Episcopalians? 
These may be termed " delicate questions," but they will, of 
necessity, come under the consideration of those who are to fix 
the value of men and women under the provisions of this bill. 

But, it is said that we hold this money as trustee of the own- 
ers of these slaves. I deny the assertion. I have already 



THE AMERICAN SLAVE-TRADE. 49 

shown that the money was placed into the hands of the trea- 
surer without authority of law, and that he now holds in his 
individual, and not in his official, capacity. That he may now 
dispose of it without any reference to the action of this House. 
We, Sir, have never consented to act as trustee of these slave- 
dealers. They could not constitute us such except by our con- 
sent. The Constitution has imposed upon us no such duty. 
Neither the President, nor his Secretary of State, nor our 
Minister at London, nor all of them acting together, could 
impose upon us the duty of acting as the trustee of these out- 
laws ; nor could they impose upon us the constitutional or the 
moral duty of legislating for the benefit of a commerce hated 
of men and cursed of God. Those high officers of government 
can impose upon me no moral obligation to participate in this 
crime of making merchandise of mankind. No, Sir, they can- 
not step between God and myself, and absolve me from the 
allegiance I owe to Him ; nor can they release me from the 
command of Him, who, speaking as never man spake, enjoined 
upon me to " do unto others as I would that they should do 
unto me." I would not be willing to suffer at the hands of my 
fellow man that, brutal degradation which this slave-trade 
inflicts upon its victims. Nor, Sir, will I by vote, or act, 
encourage or sustain others in that work, that crime of degrad- 
ing and brutalizing our fellow men, by selling them like swine 
in the market. 

Sir, I would be as willing to go forth into the city and coun- 
try, and buy up men, women, and children, and transport them 
to New Orleans and sell them, as I would to sit in this hall and 
vote for the bill before us. Sir, it is an acknowledged princi- 
ple in ethics, that the responsibility of man is measured by his 
intelligence. If that be true, I submit to gentlemen whether 
the guilt of numbers here is not even greater than is that of 
those who, under our laws, buy and sell mankind. 

These laws have been enacted by Congress ; no man denies 
or doubts that we have power to repeal them. Every school- 
boy is conscious that we possess authority to repeal those laws ; 
yet, Sir, when our constituents from the free States, send their 

5 



50 THE AMERICAN SLAVE-TRADE. 



» 



petitions here asking such repeal in respectful language, we 
treat them with contempt ; we refuse to hear them read, and in 
order to insult those who send them here, we refuse to refer or 
take any notice of them ; they are silently laid upon the table ; 
and those members who would advocate their respectful con- 
sideration, are not permitted to speak in their favor. 

But, Sir, when these slave-merchants, dealing in human 
flesh, happen to have made an unfortunate operation, they send 
us a petition to help them recover their loss ; we receive their 
petition with respect ; we treat it with marked attention ; we 
refer it to the most important committee of this body ; a bill is 
immediately reported, and attempts are made to carry it through 
without discussion. 

Thus do numbers here lend their influence and energy to 
encourage and maintain this slave-trade. We do it with a full 
knowledge of the pain and intense suffering which it inflicts 
upon our fellow men. But the slave-dealer is more ignorant ; he 
has been bred to his vocation ; his feelings have become callous 
to human suffering ; his sympathies for his fellow beings have 
been blunted ; he knows that Congress, composed of intelligent 
men, distinguished for their moral character, have authorized 
this commerce in our own species, and he pursues it with but 
little compunction of conscience ; he sees us scout all efforts to 
prevent this traffic in the bodies of men and of women, while 
we lend our efforts to encourage those engaged in it. Our 
example is respected, and bears an influence throughout the 
country. His is limited, and few are led to follow his practice. 

Now, Sir, who will deny, that the member sitting in this hall, 
voting for this bill, and to exclude all petitions for the abolition 
of this slave-trade, incurs even greater guilt than the ignorant 
dealer in human flesh ? 

I protest against all participation in such guilt. I will not 
bathe my hands in the blood of those victims. I will not be 
made a party to those crimes. I will not insult my constitu- 
ents by voting for this bill, while their voice is not permitted to 
be heard in favor of humanity. I will not lend my influence 
to carry out this speculation in the bodies of women and of 



THE AMERICAN SLAVE-TRADE. 51 



• 



children; to aid men who deserve the gallows and halter, 
instead of legislative encouragement. Patriotism, self-respect, 
the honor of our race, forbid that we should lend our legislative 
aid in favor of this slave-trade ; our love of virtue, justice, and 
humanity forbid it ; the voice of Christianity, the laws of God, 
forbid that we should become parties to the crimes of these 
slave-merchants, or to the frauds and misrepresentations of our 
minister at London. 

Sir, place this subject in whatever attitude you please, throw 
around it whatever sophistry the human intellect is capable of 
calling into exercise, yet the disgusting fact will stand portrayed 
to the world in coming time, that, in the year 1843, this Amer- 
ican Congress sat gravely legislating in aid of this traffic in 
human flesh. Let it go upon the record. Let the archives of 
this body bear to coming generations the proof that two hun- 
dred and forty-two American statesmen were on this day 
engaged in granting relief and encouragement to persons 
engaged in that execrable commerce, which Mr. Jefferson 
declared had "rendered us the scoff of infidel nations ." But 
let not my name be found among its advocates. Let not my 
descendants, in future years, be called to blush for their ances- 
tor, on reading the record of this day's proceeding. Sooner, far 
sooner, would I have it erased from the records of this House ; 
yea, sooner would I have it blotted from existence, than see it 
placed on record in favor of the bill before us. 

Yet, Sir, I am conscious that the bill will become a law. 
Gentlemen from the free States, representing constituents who 
detest the slave-trade, will vote for the bill. The house is 
committed in favor of its passage, and members are impatient 
at the delay occasioned by my remarks. Soon as I close, it 
will be pressed to the final vote, and a deed will be consum- 
mated which will excite deep and lasting astonishment in the 
minds of those, who, in future years, shall read the story of this 
day's legislation. 



RIGHTS OF THE STATES CONCERNING 
SLAVERY.* 



POWER OF THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT IN TIME OF WAR — JURISDICTION OF 
CONGRESS IN TIME OF PEACE OVER DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA — DUTY OF 
MEMBERS TO MEET THE QUESTION OF SLAVERY — RIGHT OF THE PEOPLE 
TO PETITION CONGRESS RELATING TO SLAVERY. 

[As early as the year 1832, the people of the free States sent various petitions 
to Congress relative to slavery. In 1835, a resolution was introduced by a 
slave-holder from Virginia, and adopted by the House, for suppressing all action 
upon such petitions. Similar resolutions were adopted at each Congress, up 
to 1841, when the principle was incorporated into the rules of that body. All 
these movements for suppressing the right of petition, were steadily and ably 
opposed by the Honorable John Quincy Adams and a few others who sympa- 
thized with him. At the commencement of the twenty-eighth Congress, the 
question of continuing this rule came up, and was decided in the negative. 
This decision was important, as this constitutional right was thereby regained. 
On this question Mr. Giddings delivered the following speech.] 

Mr. Speaker, — If we judge of the importance of the sub- 
ject under discussion, by the talent and zeal elicited during the 
debate, we shall surely regard it as a matter of the highest con- 
sequence. Indeed, some gentlemen have declared that it 
involves the permanency of our Federal Union. In this opin- 
ion I concur. I do not believe it possible to continue this rule 
and preserve the Union. Yet, I have been highly gratified in 
witnessing the candid and dispassionate manner in which the 
debate has been thus far conducted. Gentlemen have partici- 
pated in the discussion with that forbearance and kindness 

* Speech upon a motion to continue the rule excluding petitions respecting 
slavery. Delivered in House of Representatives, February 13, 1844. 



KIGHTS OF THE STATES. 53 

becoming statesmen engaged in the examination of matters of 
high interest to their country. The subject of slavrey has been 
examined in the spirit of candor, and gentlemen have treated 
each other with the same toleration that is exhibited on other 
occasions. I rejoice that the time has arrived when we can 
meet in this hall and compare views and examine the rights of 
different sections of the country, without excitement, and in a 
manner becoming those who feel their responsibility to the 
public. 

I am aware that the discussion of any subject relating to sla- 
very is unpleasant to a portion of our fellow members ; but, 
should gentlemen who follow me in this debate forget the deco- 
rum which is due to the dignity of this body, it shall not arise 
from any example of mine. I intend to speak forth my own 
sentiments freely ; but I hope to do so without personal offence. 

In the discharge of our legislative duties, we have reached 
that point at which we unfortunately find ourselves divided in 
opinions upon an important, subject. The adoption or rejection 
of the former rule of this House, by which the great mass of 
petitions concerning slavery have been heretofore rejected, is 
soon to be determined. 

These petitions have been characterized by those who have 
preceded me as abolition petitions ; but what those gentlemen 
understand by the term " abolition," we have yet to learn. It 
is, undoubtedly, understood by some to mean the abolition of 
slavery in the States ; by others, to refer to the abolition of 
slavery in the District of Columbia ; by others, it is understood 
to refer to the coastwise slave-trade ; by others, to the separa- 
tion of the people of the free States from the support of slavery. 
Indeed, petitions for the repeal of any of the laws now in force 
within the District of Columbia, relating to slavery, petitions to 
prohibit officers of the Federal Government from the capture 
of fugitive slaves, or against appropriating the national treasure 
to the support of slavery or the slave-trade, are denominated 
" abolition petitions" and are not suffered to be read, referred, 
or reported upon. The objections to them are, that they inter- 
fere with the rights of the people of the slave-holding States ; 
5* 



54 RIGHTS OF THE STATES 

yet no gentleman has attempted to set forth or define the rights 
which he considers as encroached upon by these petitions. 
Here all our difficulties arise. Let us once clearly determine 
the rights of the several States, in respect to slavery, and it will 
then be easy to say, whether such right is sought to be en- 
croached upon by any particular petition. These rights of the 
States were fixed by the Constitution, and we must resort to 
that instrument, to the debates in the Convention that framed 
it, and to contemporaneous history, in order to ascertain pre- 
cisely their character. 

Prior to the formation of our Federal Constitution, each State 
possessed and exercised supreme and unlimited control over the 
institution of slavery within its own territory. Virginia, in obe- 
dience to the will of her people, upheld and continued it. Mas- 
sachusetts, in the exercise of her supreme power, emancipated 
her slaves. In the exercise of this act of her sovereign power, 
she took counsel from none of her sister States ; she acted in 
obedience to the will of her people, and set an example which 
was soon after followed by six of the other original States. 
The example was well calculated to exert an influence upon the 
institution of slavery throughout the Union. Yet, whatever may 
have been the effect upon the slaves of other States, they could 
interpose no objection to this proceeding of their patriotic sister, 
for the reason that she was as independent of them on this sub- 
ject, as she was of any foreign power. 

When the Convention that framed the Constitution assem- 
bled, the delegates brought with them the same diversity of 
sentiment that exists among us to-day. One portion were hos- 
tile to slavery, and another portion were in favor of its continu- 
ance. There was, therefore, but one mode of disposing of the 
question. That was, to leave it precisely as it was, and to let 
it remain with each of the several States. Each State, there- 
fore, retained its whole and entire power over that institution. 
They surrendered no portion to the Federal Government. I 
desire to be understood distinctly on this part of the subject. I 
wish to ascertain, if possible, the precise point of disagreement 
between us. I am anxious to develop the exact issue on which 



CONCERNING SLAVERY. 55 

we are contending ; to let the country know definitely what is 
claimed by the South, and denied by the North ; and what is 
claimed by the North, and denied by the South. 

I, therefore, lay it down as one of the principles on which our 
Federal Constitution was based, that each of the several States 
should retain to themselves and their people, the entire power 
over slavery which they had previously enjoyed. In saying 
this, it is not my intention to deny the doctrine advanced by the 
venerable member from Massachusetts, (Mr. Adams,) " that, in 
case of war, when the existence of our government is threat- 
ened, we may then avail ourselves of that right of self-preserva- 
tion which is based upon the law of nature ; " and, if necessary 
to the public safety, may release any portion or all of the slaves 
in any or all of the States. It is a power which lies behind all 
constitutional provisions, and is consequent upon a state of war 
only, but has no application in time of peace. It is, I believe, 
well understood by military men ; it was practised by General 
Jackson, General Gaines, and General Jessup, and, I believe, 
by General Scott, while commanding our armies in the South. 
They did not hesitate to sever the relation of master and slave, 
whenever they believed the public good demanded it. In doing 
that, they merely exercised that power which is always attend- 
ant upon a state of war, and which is seldom denied. It there- 
fore forms no exception to the doctrine which I have asserted, 
that each of the several States now holds and enjoys the same 
power over slavery, within its own territory, that it enjoyed 
under the old confederation ; that Virginia and each of the 
slave States now holds her slaves as independently of the other 
States and of the Federal Government, as she does of Mexico 
or of other foreign powers ; that the Congress of the United 
States possesses no right to interfere with that institution in 
Virginia or any other slave State. On this point, I think south- 
ern men will agree with me. Indeed, I understand this to be 
the doctrine entertained by northern men, and that there is an 
entire concurrence of opinion on this point. 

I stated that each of the several States retains its entire 
power over the institution of slavery which it possessed under 



56 RIGHTS OF THE STATES 

the old confederation. It therefore follows, that Massachusetts 
and the free States have the same supreme and unqualified 
right to be wholly exempt from the support of slavery that they 
enjoyed prior to the adoption of the Constitution; and that 
Congress possesses no more power than does the Parliament of 
Great Britain, to involve them in the expense, the odium, or 
the guilt of that institution. That this right of the people of 
the free States to enjoy their liberty, free from all participation 
in the support of slavery, is as supreme and unlimited as is the 
right of the slave States to continue and enjoy it. I wish to 
call the particular attention of those who follow me in this 
debate to this right of the free States. 

If there be any issue between us, it must be founded on this 
particular doctrine. I, therefore, most respectfully ask south- 
ern gentlemen to meet me upon it. If they admit the correct- 
ness of my doctrine, let them say so ; if they deny it, let them 
declare such denial in a plain and direct manner. It is surely 
time that we should know and understand distinctly the cause 
of our controversy ; that we should bring forth the well defined 
subject-matter in dispute, and place it conspicuously before the 
country. In the spirit of kindness, I request them to keep no 
longer at a distance from the point in issue ; that they will no 
longer deal in vague generalities ; that they will lay aside all 
declamation ; that they will cease to denounce abolition, and 
meet the matters in controversy by fair argument and dispas- 
sionate reason. It is unbecoming us as statesmen, to occupy 
our time here contending before the nation for years, with- 
out being able to lay our finger upon the precise point in con- 
troversy. 

Mr. Speaker, — if we do not possess the moral courage to 
examine minutely and particularly the cause of contention, I 
feel that it is our duty to retire from this hall, and to give place 
to those who will not fear to meet these questions upon their 
true merits. I, Sir, am regarded as an abolitionist. I have no 
more objection to the term than Washington, or Jefferson, or 
Franklin had. I care not what name gentlemen attach to me, 
provided they do not misrepresent my principles. Of these I 



CONCERNING SLAVERY. 57 

prefer to be my own exponent ; and I repeat, that whatever 
issue I take with southern gentlemen, is based entirely upon 
this plain and obvious doctrine of the Federal Constitution, — 
that this government possesses no power whatever to involve 
the people of the free States in the support of slavery. 

Here, Sir, I take my stand, where I have always stood since 
I entered this hall. For this doctrine, I shall continue to con- 
tend, until convinced that it is erroneous. I am not to be- 
driven from it by the cry of abolition ; for if it be abolition,, 
then am I an abolitionist. Neither am I to be frightened from: 
this position by the cry of fanaticism ; for if this doctrine be 
fanaticism, then am I a fanatic. This is the doctrine which I 
have maintained in public addresses, and in private conversa- 
tion, in my writings, and in my oral communications on this 
floor and among my constituents. I go not beyond it, nor do I 
stop short of it. In this respect, I believe I may say that the 
great mass of those called abolitionists agree with me. It is true 
that they are much misunderstood and much misrepresented ; 
but I know of none who advocate any encroachment upon the 
constitutional rights of the slave States. It is true that they, 
and nearly all of our northern people, hold slavery in abhor- 
rence. They will, on all occasions, exert their moral influence 
against oppression in all its forms. They regard that a duty, 
and so do I ; and whether I am in this hall or elsewhere, I can 
never cease to exert my moral influence against slavery, 
wherever that influence may extend. But, Sir, duty teaches 
me obedience to the Constitution which I am sworn to support ; 
and while that remains unchanged, I cannot either here or 
elsewhere exert my influence to violate it. Nor do the aboli- 
tionists ask or expect such an exercise of the powers intrusted 
to us. But they and the whigs, and the great mass of those 
within my district, called democrats, demand and expect of us, 
a firm and decided resistance to all attempts to encroach upon\ 
their rights, by involving them in the support of an institution' 
which they hold in execration. 

I am, however, aware, that a large portion of our people,, 
both North and South, have been unconscious of the extent to 



58 RIGHTS OF THE STATES 

which the people of the free States have been involved in the 
support of slavery. The discussion of all subjects connected 
with that institution, has for many years been suppressed, both 
in this hall, and among the people. During these years of 
silence, this government has usurped to itself powers never 
delegated to it by the Constitution. Southern men have pressed 
the claims of slavery upon Congress, and northern men have 
quietly and without resistance permitted the government to 
become the patron of that institution, and the people of the 
free States to be made the instrument of its support. 

For many years, the treaty-making power has been in the 
habit of embracing, in almost all our treaties with the southern 
and south-western Indians, a stipulation that they should sur- 
render up, and, in some instances, that they should be vigilant 
in arresting and delivering up such fugitive slaves as should 
seek an asylum among them. For these and other stipulations, 
the money of the nation, drawn from the people of the free 
States, has been paid. For the purpose of enabling the own- 
ers of southern slaves to regain their runaway negroes, we 
waged a bloody and expensive war with the Indians of Florida. 

At the last session of Congress, we sat here at an expense 
of thousands of dollars per day, legislating for the benefit of 
slave-traders. We spent our time, and the money of the peo- 
ple, to enable slave-dealers to carry out their speculations in 
human flesh ; thus, Sir, violating the Constitution, and the con- 
stitutional rights of our people. They have sent their petitions 
to us couched in the most respectful language, asking that they 
may no longer be subjected to these abuses. And what has 
been our reply ? Why, Sir, we have thrown their petitions 
back into their faces, and denounced their signers as fanatics. 

Yet, Mr. Speaker, no man has been found willing to come 
forward and meet the subject upon its merits. No member here 
of any party, either whig or democrat, from the North or from 
the South, would hazard his reputation by saying that we pos- 
sess the power thus to apply the funds of government to these 
base purposes. Nor has any man been found who would take 
issue with the petitioners, and say to them, and to the country, 



CONCERNING SLAVERY. 59 

that they were bound thus to contribute of their wealth to the 
support of southern slavery ; but we have constantly heard the 
same answer that is now urged against receiving these peti- 
tions. That answer, and the only answer yet adduced, is the 
cry of "abolition," "fanaticism," "interference with southern 
rights," " Hartford Convention," and " dissolution of the 
Union ! " 

I may be permitted to assure gentlemen, that the people of 
the North know their rights, and that such answers to their 
petitions will neither satisfy nor silence them. If there be any 
better answer, it should be brought forward ; and gentlemen do 
themselves and their cause injustice, by neglecting to meet the 
question fairly. But if there be no other answer, — if gentle- 
men who seek the adoption of this rule, and who have pre- 
ceded me in this debate, and those who shall follow me, are 
unable to find any other objections to these petitions than such 
as I have referred to, I then ask them if they do themselves 
justice on a subject of such grave importance, by opposing 
these plain and obvious truths by mere declamation. 

In 1816, a large number of fugitive slaves had collected 
within the territory of Florida, then subject to the Spanish 
crown. They settled upon the Appalachicola river, erected 
their cabins, planted their grounds, and, with their wives and 
their little ones, were enjoying that liberty which the people of 
the North prize so highly. They also erected a fort to protect 
them. The President issued his orders to General Gaines, to 
send a force " to break up their settlement, and to return them 
to their owners." A gun-boat was sent up the river to execute 
this design. She opened a fire of hot shot upon the fort, by 
which the magazine was exploded, and two hundred and 
seventy men, women, and children were instantaneously mur- 
dered, for no other crime than a love of that liberty. 

This act was committed by our servants, acting in our name, 
and paid with our funds. Their blood rests on the people of 
this nation. It was as much the act of the North as of the 
South. Nor was this all. During the 25th Congress, a law 
was passed giving more than five thousand dollars to the ofl5- 



t'.O RIGHTS el- nir BTJLTM 

Dttra and lnni who oommitted this wholesale murder. Oar peo- 
ple have petitioned against further acts of this kind, and -hall 
ivc rejecl their requests ? During the war in Florida, our 
officers ami men were not only engaged in searching out ami 

capturing fugitive slaws, but bloodhounds were procured to aid 
in that execrable work* Indeed, if the intelligence which wo 
see in the public press ho worthy of credit, officers and men 
esnployed in our land, naval, and revenue service, have within 

a tow months past put forth their efforts to recapture persons 
fleeing from southern bondage to a land of liberty. 

These facts are regarded by our people of the North, as 
derogatory to onr national character; they hold that our Vod- 
eral Constitution was formed to perpetuate liberty, and not for 
the support of slavery. They regard these prostitutions of our 
national power as involving them in the support of slavery : 
and they send their petitions here, praying that these abuses 
may cease. These respectful petitions, addressed to their ser- 
vants here, are scouted from this hall, and treated with eon- 
tempt. Yet no man lias been found willing to stand before the 
nation, and boldly assert the right of this government thus to 
involve the people o( the free States in these outrages upon 
the rights o\ man. or that wo have the eonstitntional power to 
involve them in this war against human nature. 

When slave-dealers, with their cargoes ot human beings. 
have been shipwrecked near the British islands, in the West 
Indies, and the slaves have regained their liberty by being 
accidentally thrown apon free soil, our President has conde- 
scended to aet as the agent and solicitor of sneh traders in 
human flesh, and. in the name of the people of this nation, to 
demand o\ the British government a compensation, in dollars 
and eonts. for the liberty thns gained by his fellow men. 

Such an interest ha- onr Executive taken in this slave-trade. 

that when the persons on board the slave-ship Creole, looking 

ard to the deep degradation that awaited them in a sonth- 

d with that love of liberty which 

the God of nature has implanted in the breast o\ every man, 

upon their op] asserted and maintained the rights 



CONCERNING si \\ i ky. g] 

to which they were entitled, he demanded of the British crown 
their value In dollars and cents, as a compensation to men who 
would have been hanged under out own laws, had they fol- 
lowed the Same vocation on the shores of Afriea. 

All these arts of the government were plain and obvious 

violations of our Constitution. Thej were unauthoriied by 
any constitutional provision. They Involved the people of the 

free Stales in the support oi' an institution which they ahhor. 

Our people tool themselves dishonored by them, and have, 

therefore, sent numerous petitions, praying us \o separate this 

government from all farther participation in this unconstitu- 
tional support of slavery. These petitions were numerously 
signed by men of high respectability, of intelligence and moral 

worth. And what answers ha\ e we returned to their reasona- 
ble requests? Why, sir, we have spurned them from as, and 

have slammed our doOTS iu the faee of those from whom we 
hold our seats, and whoso servants we are. Bui wo have not 
pOS8e88ed Iho moral eouraj-v to s:iv to them, that we have the 
Constitutional power thus io involve them in the inexpiable 
guill oi' those aets to \\ hieh 1 have referred. No, Sir, we dare 
not attempt to justify ourselves by argument. We shudder ft) 

the thought <^' appealing to reason, t'ov thai is hostile to crime. 
\\'e dare "o\ rest our justification upon the force oi' truth, for 
thai would condemn us. Discussion would he equivalent to eon- 

vietion. We have, therefore, refused to Bpeak upon the sub- 
ject-matter Of these petitions. 'We have shielded ourselves 
behind this rule, whieh prohibits their being road to US, and 

then attempted to justify the rule by denouncing all M inter- 
ference with southern property" and declaiming against " luce** 

diary petitions." 

It is a most e\t raordinarv faet, that no gentleman who lias 

spoken in favor of this rule, has condescended to enter upon an 
argument to refute the propriety or duty of granting the prayer 
of one of the several classes o( petitions to which I have 
referred] and 1 predict that no one who comes after me, will 
attempt a task so difficult They will condemn all these peti- 
tions in general terms, but they will not discuss the constHu- 
6 



62 RIGHTS OF THE STATES 

tionality of any one in particular. Such discussion would lead to 
an examination of principles, — a result from which they start 
back with horror. I repeat, that those gentlemen who denounce 
abolition so loudly and eloquently, can neither be flattered nor 
provoked to meet us upon any moral, political, or constitu- 
tional question in regard to slavery, embraced in any class of 
these petitions. 

I will now proceed to the consideration of another numerous 
class of petitions, all of which are sought to be excluded by the 
adoption of this rule. They all relate to slavery within this 
district ; some of them pray for the modification, and some for 
the abolition of the slave-trade here ; others for the repeal of 
some one or more of the old laws of Maryland and Virginia, 
that have been re-enacted by Congress, and which are now in 
force within the District of Columbia ; others for the repeal of 
all laws now in force here which support slavery, and others 
for the abolition of slavery generally within this district. If 
the rule be adopted, all these petitions are to be excluded from 
being received or read by the House. 

We have listened to arguments intended to show that we 
ought not to receive these petitions. The first which I will 
notice is that of the gentleman from South Carolina, (Mr. 
Rhett,) who took it upon himself to say that the petitioners 
were not seeking the objects prayed for, but sent their petitions 
here in order to affect slavery in the States. I am acquainted 
with many of the petitioners, and know them to be men of 
intelligence, and in point of character and respectability not 
inferior to members of this body. I believe them incapable of 
saying one thing and meaning another ; and I regard the impu- 
tation as unfounded and altogether gratuitous. Other members 
urge that Congress possesses no constitutional power to abolish 
slavery in this district, and therefore these petitions ought not 
to be received. If the proposition were correct, that Congress 
has not the power to abolish slavery within this district, I 
should nevertheless regard it as our duty to receive their peti- 
tions, and to treat them respectfully, and to return civil answers 
to those who send them to us. They are sincere in their belief, 



CONCERNING SLAVERY. 63 

and they approach us in respectful language; and shall we 
throw back the petitions to them, and insult them by a con- 
temptuous silence? If we differ from them in opinion, it 
would be more in accordance with my views of propriety to 
receive the petitions, refer them, and let a respectful report be 
made, showing the error into which the petitioners have fallen. 
This government is founded upon the will of the people ; and 
when they become dissatisfied with it, they have the power to 
change or alter it, or the agents employed to carry it on. It is, 
therefore, important that every cause of discontent should be 
removed from the public mind. 

Other gentlemen appear to think that the petitioners rest 
their demands merely upon the reception of their petitions ; 
and that if we receive them and lay them on the table with- 
out farther notice, it will satisfy the signers. I will assure 
gentlemen who adopt these views, that they mistake the senti- 
ments of those who demand our attention. They deal in no 
technicalities. They regard us as their servants, sent here to do 
their business, and carry out their wishes ; and if we differ 
from them in respect to our powers', or in our views of policy, 
they expect us to say so frankly, and in a respectful manner to 
point out the constitutional principles, or the policy which for- 
bids a compliance with their requests. They are competent to 
weigh and judge of the reasons which guide our action. They 
regard Truth as omnipotent, and are willing to bow to its dic- 
tates. They feel that Error alone seeks obscurity, and attempts 
to hide itself behind the silence of mock dignity. If, there- 
fore, we attempt to dispose of these petitions, by laying them 
silently on the table, and refuse to assign our reasons for the 
act, it will become their duty to dismiss us, and to send agents 
here who possess the moral courage to set forth the reasons on 
which they act. 

But, Mr. Speaker, I am desirous of meeting the great and; 
principal issue which gentlemen have tendered us on this part 
of the subject. If the existence of slavery in this district be 
constitutional, if it have any legal existence within this ten 
miles square, it must be by force of our laws. I have no hesi- 



64 RIGHTS OF THE STATES 

tation in saying, that if slavery has a legal existence here, we 
have the same power over it that we have over the subject of 
crimes, the collection of debts, or any other municipal regula- 
tion. 

Slavery is defined by jurists as " the creature of municipal 
law." Yet it is quite certain that one man may hold another 
in subjection, may scourge him into obedience, without law, or 
even against the law under which they live. When slaves 
were originally imported to Virginia, there was no law author- 
izing slavery there. Africans were brought there, and sold, 
and held as property. This was done by the superior physical 
and intellectual power of the white people. Under the moral 
code of that day, it was believed to be right and proper to 
enslave the heathen. But those heathen soon were converted 
to Christianity, and their religion would not permit them to 
hold Christians in such degradation. The legislature, there- 
fore, interposed its power and declared that baptism, or conver- 
sion, should not be regarded as an emancipation of the slave. 
This was the first statute in that State which recognized sla- 
very. It did not establish it, but merely recognized the inte- 
rest of the master in the body of his slave. 

The slaves, however, soon evinced a disposition to go from 
place to place, at the dictation of their own desires. This pro- 
pensity rendered them useless to their masters. The legisla- 
ture, therefore, passed a law, authorizing any constable or other 
person to arrest any slave found away from his master's planta- 
tion without a passport, and to return him to his master. This, 
of itself, did not appear to answer the purpose, and the consta- 
ble or other person making the arrest, was authorized by 
another statute to flog the servant, and to pass him over to the 
nearest constable, who should also flog him, and pass him to the 
next, until he reached his master, who was bound to pay a cer- 
tain quantity of tobacco for the arrest, and for whipping the 
slave. But it was found that the slave would often run from 
those who attempted to arrest him, and would resist with his 
physical powers those who laid hands upon him. It therefore 
became necessary further to curtail the rights of the slave, and 



CONCERNING SLAVERY. 65 

a statute law was then passed, authorizing the constable, or 
other person who should attempt to arrest such slave, to shoot 
or kill him, if he ran from such officer or other person, or if he 
resisted them after his arrest. 

A subsequent statute forbade the slave to raise his hand in 
opposition to any white man, even in defence of his life. The 
natural rights of the slave were thus taken from him, one after 
another, until he was by statute law reduced to his present de- 
graded condition. These laws gave to the master, and those 
who were not slaves, powers over their servants which were 
new and unheard of. As I have shown, they authorized the 
master to whip and scourge and torture the slave, and, under 
certain circumstances, to shoot and murder him. These powers 
of the master were based entirely upon statute law, and the 
disabilities of the slave were established by the same authority. 

Now I think few men will deny that the legislature of Vir- 
ginia or of Maryland had full and ample power to change, 
modify, or repeal any or all these statutes at the pleasure of 
their legislature. This point admits of no doubt or argument. 
It is equally plain that the repeal of any one or more of these 
acts of the legislature would, to a certain extent, be a modifica- 
tion of slavery, and that the repeal of all these laws would be 
a total abolition of that institution. 

Notwithstanding the apparent correctness of these proposi- 
tions, some gentlemen deny that the legislature of Virginia 
possessed the power to abolish slavery in her territory. They 
will not deny her power to repeal her own laws. This propo- 
sition is so plain, that they will shrink from a denial of it. 
They leave that point untouched, and proceed to say that her 
legislature cannot abolish slavery within her territory. Now, 
Sir, all that abolitionists ask, and all that the slaves of that 
State will ask, is the repeal of those laws. Let them be re- 
pealed, and we will no longer contend about abstractions, but 
we will let slavery take care of itself. 

But gentlemen urge that the " master has a vested right of 
property in the slave." I wish some one of those eloquent 
members who have so often repeated this declaration, had con- 
6* 



66 RIGHTS OF THE STATES 

descended to inform us from whence the master derives his 
title to his slave. I ask from whence is this " vested right " 
derived ? Biblical history informs us, that " God gave to man 
dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowls of the 
air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every 
creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth." 

These are property, and we derive our title from Him who 
created them. But I have yet to learn that any man holds title 
to his fellow man from that high source. Where then does he 
obtain his title ? Why, Sir, he holds it entirely from statute 
law — from the laws that authorize the master to whip and 
shoot his slave, and which take from the slave his natural rights 
of self-defence and of locomotion. Repeal those laws, and 
these vested rights would be divested. Let the legislature take 
from the limbs of the slave the cords with which they have 
bound him, and he will stand forth a freeman. He will then 
possess as much right of property in his master, as his master 
will in him ; or rather, neither will possess any right to, or 
power over, the other. 

Let us throw as much obscurity as we can around this sub- 
ject, it will remain perfectly clear to every intelligent mind, 
that this right of property, and the whole power of the master 
over his slave, is derived from statute law, which may be 
repealed at the pleasure of the legislature. The slaves are as 
much a class of human society as the masters are. The muni- 
cipal laws have degraded them, and elevated the masters. The 
same laws have given power to the master, and have forbidden 
the slave to exercise his natural rights. But these laws are at 
all times subject to the legislative power, and may be changed, 
modified, or repealed at pleasure. This was the situation of 
slavery within the District of Columbia, while it belonged to 
the States of Virginia and Maryland. 

In the year 1788-9, those States, by their separate deeds 
of cession, surrendered their powers over the territory now 
composing this district to the United States. The general 
government was fully authorized to take possession of it under 
a particular provision of the Constitution, and in pursuance of 



CONCERNING SLAVERY. 67 

that power accepted the grant; and by act of Congress, ap- 
proved February 27th, 1801, provided for its government. 
When Congress once spread its jurisdiction over this district, 
and passed laws for its government, the laws of Maryland and 
of Virginia ceased of course to have further force or effect 
here. This proposition is too plain to require illustration. 
From that instant, the power and laws of Virginia and Mary- 
land ceased, and those of Congress took effect, and from that 
day to this, have had exclusive force and effect over the dis- 
trict and persons therein. But what may have misled a casual 
observer is, that the laws then in force within the States were 
re-enacted by Congress, and thereby made laws of the United 
States ; so that the people within the district, on each side of 
the river, continued to be governed by the same municipal laws 
that had previously been in force there. 

The same remark applies to all other municipal laws then in 
force here, — whether they had relation to the punishment of 
crimes, to the collection of debts, or to any of the relations 
which men hold to slavery. 

I desire to be understood as stating the case most strongly in 
favor of our opponents. For my own part, I deny the power 
of Congress to adopt, continue, or to uphold slavery here or 
anywhere else. The objects of the Constitution were "to 
secure liberty," and not to promote or sustain slavery. If we 
had the constitutional power to sustain slavery, we had the 
power to create it. If we had the power to create it, we pos- 
sessed power to say what class of people should be slaves, and 
what class should be masters. Yet I think no man will urge, 
that we possessed the power to enslave the white people who 
resided here. But I have no time to argue that point. The 
most favorable view for our opponents is, to say, that this dis- 
trict then presented a political blank, on which we possessed 
the power to affix the dark character of slavery, or the more 
congenial one of liberty. 

In pursuance of this power, Congress passed the act approved 
27th February, 1801. By that law, all those acts to which I 
have alluded, became " acts of Congress," and we now possess 



68 EIGHTS OF THE STATES 

the same power to alter or repeal any or all of them, that the 
State of Maryland or Virginia possessed prior to the cession. 
We may modify slavery, by repealing the act authorizing per- 
sons to arrest slaves ; or that which authorizes any person to 
shoot a slave who will not surrender when ordered, or that 
which forbids him the right of defending himself; or we may 
repeal all of them, and thereby abolish slavery altogether. If 
any gentleman will deny this doctrine, I would feel under deep 
obligations to him, if he would point us to the particular law 
which we have not power to repeal or amend at pleasure. But 
no man, I think, will be found willing to attempt that task. Our 
judiciary committee have lately reported a bill for the repeal of 
some of those laws adopted by the Act of 1801, and, from the 
reports, both of the majority and minority, some of whom are 
slave-holders, it would appear that the power of Congress to 
repeal any of those laws was not doubted by a single member. 

But the repeal of those laws is objected to, on the ground 
that the abolition of slavery here will be likely to affect that 
institution in the adjoining States. That objection I regard as 
a strong argument in favor of its immediate extirpation from 
the district. I deny that we are under the least conceivable 
obligation to continue slavery here, in order that it may be pro- 
longed in the States. The Constitution has imposed no such 
duty upon Congress, or upon the people of the free States. 
We say to southern gentlemen, take care of your own slaves. 
The institution belongs not to us. We have no concern in the 
matter. It was never brought into the political copartnership. 
We will have nothing to do with it, except to use our constitu- 
tional efforts to eradicate it from the face of the earth. We 
hold it in deep abhorrence, and we deny the right of Congress 
to involve the people of the free States in its expense, its turpi- 
tude, or its odium. 

Our motto is, " hands off!" Leave us to enjoy our liberty. 
We will not be contaminated with slavery to any extent. We 
will wash our hands of it. We will separate ourselves from it, 
and make plain the line of demarcation between our people and 
that institution. We will purify ourselves from its corruptions 



CONCERNING SLAVERY. 69 

and its crimes, and leave it where the Constitution left it, con- 
fined strictly to the States in which it exists. 

Mr. Rayner, of North Carolina, said he desired to interrupt 
the gentleman from Ohio, in order to propound a question to 
him. 

Mr. Giddings. Certainly. 

Mr. Rayner. I wish to inquire, whether the gentleman 
believes the decalogue to be of Divine origin ? 

Mr. Giddings. I do; but I would not, if it sanctioned 
slavery. 

Mr. Rayner. The tenth commandment says, "thou shalt 
not covet thy neighbor's man-servant nor his maid-servant." 
What does the gentleman understand by that ? 

Mr. Giddings. I have servants at home, — hired servants, 
not slaves. I hope the gentleman does not covet them ; and 
God forbid that I should covet his slaves. 

But, Mr. Speaker, I have shown that slavery exists in this 
district by virtue of the act of Congress, to which I have 
referred. That law was passed by the aid of northern as well 
as southern votes. For its existence, and for its continuance, 
the people of the free States and their representatives are 
responsible, as well as those of the slave States. It is our law 
that upholds and sustains slavery here. It is our law that 
authorizes the master, within this city, to scourge and torture 
his fellow man, until he shall become the pliant instrument of 
his own will. It is our law that forbids the slave to raise his 
hand in self-defence. It is our law that authorizes any consta- 
ble or other person to shoot him, if he attempts to flee from the 
cruelty and oppression which now surround him. These are 
our laws, and we, Sir, the representatives of the free States, 
boasting of our love of liberty, of our hatred of oppression, of 
our exalted devotion to the Rights of Man, year after year sit 
in this hall, and refuse to repeal these barbarous laws of our 
own enacting, or even to suffer our constituents respectfully to 
request us to relieve them from this load of moral guilt which 
Congress has brought upon them. And the question now is, 



70 RIGHTS OF THE STATES 

Shall we continue contemptuously to spurn their petitions from 
us? 

I am aware that gentlemen are constantly menacing us with 
a dissolution of the Union, if we agitate this subject. I answer, 
we will not cease to assert our constitutional rights to be 
exempt from slavery, on account of these threats. Release us 
from this unconstitutional support of that institution, and of 
course we shall then have no cause to agitate or discuss slavery 
in this hall. But, while you take from us our money to sup- 
port slavery, while you dishonor us by making us the support- 
ers of the coastwise slave-trade, while we are involved in the 
crime of slavery in this district, we shall not be frightened into 
a silent submission to these violations of the Constitution, by 
threats to dissolve the Union. 

The Union was formed upon the basis of the Constitution ; it 
can only be preserved by maintaining the Constitution. If, 
Sir, the rights of the North, under the federal compact, are to 
be violated and trampled upon ; if we are to involve ourselves 
in the blood-stained guilt of slavery, — to be disgraced before 
the civilized world, by supporting the slave-trade as the condi- 
tion, and the only condition on which the Union can be pre- 
served, — then, Sir, we shall not hesitate in our choice. Our 
southern friends may hold their bondmen in subjection, but they 
must not enslave the freemen of the North. 

If slaves are to be held within this district, they must be 
held without our aid. If the master here continues to tyran- 
nize over his fellow man ; if he continues to hold his brother in 
subjection by the torture of the whip and scourge ; if he shoots 
him for refusing to surrender at his command, or if he takes his 
life for defending himself, he must commit these crimes without 
the aid or sanction of the people whom I represent. 

Neither our moral nor political power will be prostituted to 
the support of such a warfare upon mankind. In saying this, I 
do not allude to the abolitionists particularly. I refer to the 
feelings and sentiments of our whigs, our democrats, and our 
liberty men. I refer to the sentiment of the 'great mass of 



CONCERNING SLAVERY. 71 

northern men, of all parties, denominations, and classes. They 
generally concur in the wish and determination to separate 
themselves from the corruption and disgrace of these laws of a 
darker and comparatively barbarous age. 

There is a tide in public sentiment now rolling on, which will 
inevitably sweep these laws from existence. That tide is going 
forward with resistless force. Demagogues, politicians, and po- 
litical partisans are unable to stop or even check it in its course. 
Its progress is visible to the most careless observer. Each 
week bears witness to its increasing power. The changes in 
this hall are such as to silence the most skeptical. Nor can 
political interests or prejudices drive from our breasts the feel- 
ings of humanity and patriotism. The great apostle of southern 
slavery may thunder forth his bulls of excommunication against 
his political friends ; he may pronounce his political anathemas 
against those who act in favor of the Constitution and of human- 
ity; but his denunciations will prove as useless as they are 
harmless. His political friends in this hall will never consent 
to continue the traffic in mankind, which is now carried on in 
this district ; for, if we may credit the reports of the day, there 
have been more than five thousand men, women, and children 
sold and transported from this district to southern slave-mar- 
kets within the year past ; and that, too, by virtue of our laws 
passed by Congress, and which we refuse to repeal. 

Yes, Sir, you may look from those windows, and view the 
principal slave-prison in the midst of this city of boasted free- 
dom. There, Sir, within its gloomy walls, are now sighing and 
groaning the victims doomed under our law to the slave-markets 
of the South. Who will estimate the amount of suffering and 
woe that exists within its hated cells ? Count there the mothers 
torn from their children ; the sisters violently separated from 
their brothers and parents by the execrable dealers in human 
flesh ; the children forcibly taken from their parents, and herded 
together waiting for the sailing of the slave-ship to convey 
them to their gloomy destinies upon the rice, cotton, and sugar 
plantations of the South, and then say whether we will receive 
petitions to stop this accursed traffic. 



72 RIGHTS OF THE STATES. 

Let me say to every member of this House, whether he 
come from the North or from the South, that he who refuses to 
receive these petitions, — he who refuses to discuss this sub- 
ject, — and he who refuses to repeal these acts of Congress, will 
be held responsible to the country, to posterity, and to God, for 
the crimes committed under the protection of these laws. 

[Here Mr. Giddings's allotted hour expired.] 



THE AMISTAD NEGROES.' 



HISTORY OF THEIR IMPORTATION AND ESCAPE — THEIR RIGHTS UNDER THE 
LAW OF NATIONS — OUR DUTIES TOWARD THEM — OUR TREATY STIPULA- 
TIONS — ATTEMPT OF THE SENATE TO MODIFY THE LAW OF NATIONS BY 
RESOLUTION — TIMIDITY OF SENATORS. 

[Mr. Ingersoll, of Pennsylvania, Chairman of the Committee on Foreign 
Affairs, reported a bill to pay the Spaniards, who claimed to own the negroes 
on board the Amistad, seventy thousand dollars. The bill was accompanied by 
an elaborate report in favor of the payment; and the author, Mr. Ingersoll, 
moved to print ten thousand extra copies. This motion was designed to give 
influence to the measure; and Mr. Giddings, desiring to meet the subject at 
the first legitimate stage of* the proceedings, brought the whole merits of the 
bill before the House on this motion, by the subjoined speech. After Mr. Gid- 
dings had closed his remarks, a motion was made to lay the proposition to print 
on the table. This was carried; and neither the bill nor report was ever called 
up for consideration afterwards.] 

Mr. Speaker, — I am opposed to the motion of the gentle- 
man from Pennsylvania, to print ten thousand extra copies of 
this report. If the motion be sustained, it will imply a favora- 
ble consideration of the principles advanced in the report. It, 
therefore, becomes important that gentlemen should understand 
its precise character and doctrines before the vote shall be 
taken. 

In 1839, a number of slaves were imported from Africa to 
the island of Cuba, in violation of the laws of Spain, and con- 
trary to her treaty stipulations. When they reached Havana 
they were imprisoned in the barracoons until a sale was made 

* Speech on motion to print extra copies of the Report of the Committee on 
Foreign Affairs. Delivered in the House of Representatives, April 18, 1844. 

7 



74 THE AMISTAD NEGROES. 

of fifty -two of their number to two Spanish slave-dealers named 
Montez and Ruiz, who appear to have purchased them of the 
importers, in order to carry them to " Principe," on the south 
end of the island. For this purpose, they obtained from the 
Governor licenses to transport fifty-two "ladinos" or legal 
slaves, to that place. It should be borne in mind, that these 
passports were granted on application of the slave-dealers, 
while the people to be. thus transported were in the barracoons, 
shut out from all intercourse with any human being who sym- 
pathized with them, or who was disposed to aid them to regain 
their liberty. 

Mr. Ingersoll. The gentleman from Ohio is stating facts 
that do not appear upon the record. 

Mr. Giddings. I am aware that the record does not go 
into detail so far as to say, in express language, that these peo- 
ple were not present at the time these licenses were granted ; 
but it shows they were imprisoned from the time they reached 
Havana until shipped on board the Amistad. Of course they 
could not have been at the Governor's palace when he granted 
these permits. The facts I was stating are, therefore, author- 
ized and confirmed by the record. Indeed, all are conscious 
that, in such cases, the negro is not consulted. The slave- 
dealer no more thinks of it, than he would of consulting a 
horse or an ox, when about to sell him. 

The passports were made out, and the permits were deliv- 
ered, granting to these slave-merchants license to take fifty- 
two " ladinos " from Havana to Principe. The license was 
not given to the negroes to go there, but the parties to the 
transaction were Montez and Ruiz on one part, and the Gover- 
nor-General on the other. 

The negroes were shipped on board the Amistad, as other 
property was shipped, and the vessel took her departure for 
Principe on the 26th June, 1839, and, after being five days at 
sea, they rose upon those who held them in durance, and 
asserted their right to liberty. In the struggle that followed, 
the captain and cook were slain, and the other persons, form- 
ing the crew and passengers, surrendered, and the negroes thus 



THE AMISTAD NEGROES. 75 

became masters of the vessel. They, however, appear to have 
been actuated by no other motive than a love of liberty. They 
shed no more blood than was necessary to obtain their freedom. 
They placed two of the sailors belonging to the ship on board 
a boat, in order that they might reach the shore. They 
retained Montez and Ruiz on board to navigate the ship, and 
directed them to steer for Africa. These men, being unwilling 
to go to Africa, ran the vessel for New England, and in August 
reached the eastern end of Long Island. A portion of the 
crew went on shore to procure water and provisions. While 
they were on shore for that purpose, Lieutenant Gedney, of the 
navy, took charge of the ship and of the persons on board, 
claiming vessel and people^ as "derelict property." Some of 
the inhabitants also arrested the negroes on shore, and, claim- 
ing them to be property, insisted upon their right to salvage, 
as though they had been so many boxes of dry goods. Montez 
and Ruiz claimed to be owners of the ship and cargo, and of 
the people on board. The negroes claimed that they were free 
under the laws of nature, of nations, and of Spain. They 
denied that they had ever been slaves under the laws of Cuba 
or any other government. The case was managed by able 
counsel, and, after the most mature deliberation, the court 
decided them to be free ; and they were, therefore, permitted 
to enjoy their liberty. They returned to their native country 
long since ; and now, after the lapse of four years, it is urged 
"that the court erred ; and the Committee on Foreign Affairs 
report a bill to take seventy thousand dollars from the people 
of this nation to pay these slave-holders for their loss of human 
flesh. Most of this sum must come from the people of the free 
States, who hold this traffic in detestation. 

The proposition goes one degree beyond any other ever 
made to this body. We have been called on to sustain our. 
own coastwise slave-trade, but never were we asked to support 
the African slave-trade, until the presentation of the report 
under consideration. We have been called on, as the House 
are aware, to legislate for the encouragement of our own slave- 
merchants, but never, until this report came before us, were 



76 THE AMISTAD NEGROES. 

we asked to sustain the slave-dealers of Cuba. We have 
surely entered upon a new era in our national legislation. 
The people of the free States should certainly understand the 
burdens we are about to place upon them. 

The advocates of oppression are desirous of preparing the 
public mind to receive the insult about to be tendered the peo- 
ple of the North. Hence the necessity of sending out this 
extraordinary number of the report, which is, perhaps, the 
ablest vindication of the foreign slave-trade that has emanated 
from any legislative body during the present century. And, it 
is hoped, that this argument will have the effect of reconciling 
our people of the North to the degradation of becoming involved 
in the guilt of sustaining this commerce. 

The author of the report is entitled to much credit for the 
boldness of his positions. To stand forth upon the records of 
our nation as the advocate of Spanish slave-merchants ; to 
espouse the cause of foreign slave-dealers, and to denounce 
those who oppose that " execrable commerce," requires at this 
day no small portion of moral courage. The report in ques- 
tion, with great gravity, proposes to review and examine the 
solemn decision of the highest judicial tribunal known to our 
laws. It goes on to point out the supposed errors, and pro- 
poses that we shall correct them. 

This, I believe, is the first proposition of the kind ever 
brought before this body. A new precedent is sought to be 
established. We are to erect ourselves into a court for the 
correction of errors committed in the judicial branch of govern- 
ment. How far the precedent is to extend, I know not ; nor 
am I able to say, whether this supervisory, power is also to 
extend over the executive department, or not. We have gene- 
rally found much more business than we have been able to 
transact, while we confined ourselves to the legitimate subjects 
of legislation. But if, to these ordinary duties, we add that of 
a court for the correction of errors, it will become necessary to 
have another department formed, whose duty it shall be to 
legislate for the nation. And what, I ask, is the occasion 
which demands of us thus to assume new duties unknown to 



THE AMISTAD NEGROES. 77 

the Constitution ? Why, Sir, it is nothing less than to pay a 
sum of money from the public treasury to these slave-traders, 
in a case where the law will not give it ; where respect for 
ourselves, for our own consistency, and for the character of the 
nation, forbid it ; where justice, humanity, and the Constitution 
forbid it. 

We appropriate a million of dollars annually to suppress the 
African slave-trade, and to hang our own people who engage 
in it ; and we are now asked to pay a large sum to these Span- 
ish slave-dealers, to encourage them to persevere in their 
accursed vocation. How many gentlemen who placed their 
names on record but a few days since in favor of so large an 
appropriation of money to suppress this African slave-trade, 
are now willing to record their names in. favor of an appropria- 
tion of seventy thousand dollars to promote it ? How many 
are prepared to vote for that trade to-day who voted against it 
yesterday ? 

But I object entirely to sitting in judgment upon the doings 
of the Supreme Court. It constitutes no part of our legitimate 
duties ; it is not embraced within our constitutional powers. 

As an evidence of the impropriety of entering upon such an 
undertaking, I need only refer to some points in this report. 
The first error assigned by the committee, to which I will call 
the attention of the House, is this, — that the court did not 
regard the passports or license, given by the Governor of Cuba 
to Montez and Ruiz, as conclusive evidence against these Afri- 
cans. The committee speak of these passports as " documen- 
tary evidence of a high nature," and appear to regard them as- 
conclusively showing that the negroes were slaves. I have 
heretofore stated that they were given by the Governor to 
Montez and Ruiz, while the negroes were not present. It was 
done without evidence, or even the least inquiry whether these 
people were "ladinos" or not. The license was merely to 
take fifty-two "ladinos" from the Havana to Port Principe, 
But the Governor called no witness to ascertain whether these 
people were "ladinos" or "bozzals" legal slaves or colored 
persons, imported against law, and, therefore, free. He made 
7* 



78 THE AMISTAD NEGROES. 

no inquiry on that point. He did not in this license refer to 
these people in any respect ; that paper refers, in express lan- 
guage, to " ladinos" while these people are shown to be " boz- 
zals ; " and the license, therefore, could not refer to them, but 
to colored men who were legal slaves. 

The negroes were not parties to this instrument; had no 
voice in the transaction ; and could not in reason, nor in law, 
be affected by it to any extent. I need not cite authorities to 
prove this point. Every farmer and every mechanic will 
understand that no two men, by any writing or transaction, 
can affect the legal rights or the interest of a third person, who 
is absent, and ignorant of their doings. No two men, under 
Spanish law or American law, can take from a third person a 
sheep or a swine in that manner ; much less can they rob such 
third person of his liberty. 

These passports were doubtless evidence between the parties 
to them. They bound the Governor who made them, and 
being official, were evidence to the custom-house officers, show- 
ing the authority of Montez and Ruiz to carry fifty-two " ladi- 
nos" to Principe. This was the sole, the only purpose for 
which they were executed. Montez and Ruiz had paid the 
customary duty, and these licenses were evidence that the 
Governor had received it. Here their legal effect ended. The 
idea that he was in any degree affecting the claim of these 
people to freedom, by executing this license, never entered the 
mind of the Governor, or of the slave-dealers. 

Mr. Ingersoll. The Governor had the bills of sale by 
which the negroes were transferred to Montez and Ruiz before 
him, when he granted the passports. 

Mr. Giddings. I have no recollection of that fact. But 
suppose it were true ; it does not in any degree affect the posi- 
tion. These bills of sale were made out and signed by the 
importers, who, under the Spanish treaty and Spanish laws, 
are pirates. They had brought these people from Africa, and 
knew they were not " ladinos." They sold them to Mont* 
and Ruiz, who, also, as appears from the record, knew they 
were not " ladinos," and who were equally pirates. Now I 



THE AMISTAD NEGROES. 79 

can hardly believe that the honorable chairman of the Commit- 
tee on Foreign Affairs, (Mr. Ingersoll,) will urge that a bill of 
sale made by one pirate to another without oath, would be 
regarded as possessing any validity either here, or in any court 
of justice. 

Suppose the honorable chairman who framed this report was 
seized, together with fifty other citizens of Philadelphia, by 
these same pirates ; carried to Havana ; imprisoned there in 
the barracoons ; and, while thus confined, their captors were to 
make bills of sale to Montez and Ruiz, who should lay them 
before the Governor, and obtain permits to take fifty-two 
" ladinos " to Principe, — would the gentleman admit himself 
and friends to be thus manufactured into slaves? Does he 
admit slave-dealers to possess such power ? Would the Gov- 
ernor's permit be acknowledged by him as evidence that he is 
in fact a " ladino," a legal slave ? 

The law would be the same with him and his neighbors, that 
it is with these Africans. These " bills of sale " would be as 
valid when offered in evidence against the gentleman, as when 
offered against Cinquez and his associates. So, too, the Gov- 
ernor's permits. They would prove the honorable chairman to 
be a slave, to the same extent which they show these Africans, 
but no farther. Now, Sir, I am not desirous of promulgating 
the principles contained in this report, among my constituents. 
We may send this report to the people of my district, but no 
one there would be likely to sanction the doctrines it sets forth. 

The report speaks of these Africans as "murderers and 
pirates." Opprobrious epithets cost but little. The word 
"murderer," is as easily written as "African," and to those 
who reflect but little, it carries at least an imputation of guilt ; 
and it may impress such minds with the idea, that a person 
held in degrading slavery, in violation of law, and of natural 
right, ought not to assert his freedom, or slay the piratical 
slave-dealer who oppresses him. The time was, when Africans 
seized and held Americans in bondage. They had as much 
right and as much law to do so, as these Spanish pirates had 
to seize and enslave these Africans. 



80 THE AMISTAD NEGROES. 

In 1803-4, our citizens were held in Algerine slavery, and 
there is not a reason nor an argument now brought forward by 
this committee in favor of this claim, which those Algerines 
might not have urged with greater force, in favor of holding 
our people as slaves. Yet the whole civilized world pro- 
nounced those followers of Mohammed, " pirates and robbers ; " 
while this report refers to Montez and Ruiz as " much-abused 
Spanish gentlemen." We slew the Algerines, and this com- 
mittee desire us to give these more guilty slave -merchants of 
Cuba money instead of a halter. If the Algerines deserved 
death, these Spaniards are more worthy of it. If Decatur, 
and Caldwell, and Sommers performed generous and noble 
deeds in butchering the Algerines, Cinquez and his associates 
performed more gallant acts, and are more worthy of our 
admiration. Yet this report is a labored attempt to disparage 
deeds of heroic patriotism. It endeavors to fix odium upon 
these Africans for defending their liberty, for faithfully per- 
forming one of the highest and most sacred duties which 
ever devolved upon man. I do not 'wish to impress such das- 
tardly sentiments upon our American youth. I would sooner, 
far sooner, spend this seventy thousand dollars in erecting a 
monument to perpetuate the memory of those rude Africans, 
than to give it to those hucksterers in human flesh. 

Another feature of this report is, in my view, derogatory to 
the character of the American people. I allude to that part 
of it which attributes the efforts of those who are now endeav- 
oring to maintain the doctrines, and arouse the spirit of free- 
dom among the people, to " British influence." It conveys the 
idea that our hatred of slavery, our war against oppression, 
against the crimes of the slave-trade, are called into action by 
" foreign influences." Sir, the imputation is unworthy of any 
committee of this body ; it is unworthy of this House ; it is 
unworthy of the American character ; it is untrue and unjust. 

It was this love of freedom, this hatred of oppression, which 
impelled our pilgrim fathers to leave their native land, to bid 
adieu to all the ties that bound them to the mother country, 
and meet dangers upon the trackless deep ; to encounter the 



THE AMISTAD NEGROES. 81 

hardships, privations, and sufferings which awaited them amid 
the wilderness of this new world. It was this love of freedom 
which guided the pen of Jefferson and his associates, when 
with unanimous voice they proclaimed the great, undying truth 
of man's equality, as the cause of their final separation from 
Britain, and from " British influence." 

And, Sir, are the people of this republic now to be told, that 
the doctrines uttered by our fathers have been repudiated 
by their sons ? That the high-souled love of liberty, so zeal- 
ously inculcated by the heroes and patriots of the revolution, 
has fled from the bosoms of their descendants ? That it is only 
kept alive in this republic by " British influence ? " Have we, 
Sir, yielded those principles for which so much effort was put 
forth, so much treasure expended, and so much blood was shed 
in our revolutionary struggle ? Do the sons of the pilgrim 
fathers now bow submissively to the " dark spirit of slavery," 
unless operated upon by " foreign influences ? " If such be the 
case, let us mourn over our degeneracy ; but, in the name of 
justice, let us not incur the unnecessary expense of publishing 
such facts to the world, by sending this report to the people. 

But, Sir, what shall we say of those who practically deny 
these doctrines, and uphold wrong, injustice, oppression, and 
crime, — those who stand forth as the open advocates of this 
Spanish slave-trade in all its hated deformity, — who would 
sustain that execrable commerce in human flesh at the expense 
of our laboring people, — who would appropriate the earnings 
of our freemen of the North to encourage Spanish slave-deal- 
ers in their purchase and sale of fathers and mothers and child- 
ren ? . I will not accuse them of being operated upon by slave- 
trading influence. I leave them, their influences and motives, 
to the judgment of those to whom we are all accountable ; " to 
their own masters, they must stand or fall." 

Another portion of this report speaks of these heroic Afri- 
cans, as the property of their Spanish oppressors. I, Sir, deny 
" that man can hold property in man." The doctrine that one 
man may hold another as property, had its origin in an igno- 
rant and a barbarous age, among an ignorant and a barbarous 



82 THE AMISTAD NEGROES. 

people. It is opposed to the more enlightened views of the 
present era, and at war with the first principles of civil liberty. 
It was denied by the enlightened jurists of England, nearly a 
century since. It was denied by Mr. Madison at the very 
formation of our Constitution. 

Mr. Ingersoll. I wish to know where the evidence of 
Mr. Madison's opinions may be found ? 

Mr. Giddings. They were recorded by himself in " the 
Madison papers," among the debates on framing the Constitu- 
tion. He declared " it would be wrong to admit in the Consti- 
tution that man can hold property in man." This committee, 
however, entertain a different opinion. They deny man's 
equality of natural rights ; they take issue with the signers 
of our Declaration of Independence, that the right to liberty is 
inalienable ; they make war upon the doctrine " that govern- 
ments are instituted among men to secure the blessings of 
liberty ; " and insist that we shall turn aside from our ordinary 
subjects of legislation, and exert the influence of this American 
Congress to secure these Spanish slave-dealers in the commis- 
sion of crimes which chill the blood of every lover of liberty ; 
and then they ask us to print ten thousand copies of their 
argument on this subject, and send them out to the people. 

Sir, man may be chained and fettered ; he may be scourged 
and tortured until he surrenders his independence, his will, his 
intellect ; until he becomes degraded and brutalized, robbed of 
his liberty, of his associations, of his hope of happiness ; until 
the only apparent evidence of his manhood shall be his external 
form, the image of his Maker ; but you cannot transform him 
into a brute, a chattel. Low down in the deepest recesses $f the 
heart, the fire of immortality will continue to burn. It cannot 
be smothered, nor extinguished ; and when he sees an opportu- 
nity, he will arise from his stupor, assert his right to freedom, 
and by the power of his own arm, will vindicate the dignity of 
his nature. 

The case before us is a beautiful illustration of this idea. 
These Africans, bred amid the ignorance and superstition of 
their native land, were seized, placed in irons, whipped, im- 



THE AMISTAD NEGROES. 83 

prisoned, sold like brutes. Montez and Ruiz purchased them ; 
took bills of sale, as they would in the purchase of mules or 
sheep. They thought the love of liberty had been driven from 
their breasts ; that the last lingering desire for freedom had 
been extinguished. They vainly thought the immortal intel- 
lect had been blotted out, and the image of God reduced to a 
level with swine. They called them property. But when 
upon the mighty deep, where no aid could be obtained to hold 
them in that condition, the hidden fire of their natures burst 
forth into a flame ; their chains were cast from them, their fet- 
ters were broken, their arms were nerved, they struck for free- 
dom, and those who attempted to restrain their action, were 
laid low in death. Those who had purchased and claimed 
them as property, trembled, turned pale, surrendered, and plead 
for mercy at their hands. They were glad to take the places 
which had been occupied by these Africans. These " Spanish 
gentlemen," as the committee term them, became subject to 
the quondam slaves, and as much the property of Cinquez and 
his associates, as they had been the property of the Spaniards. 
They were held by plainly the same title, brute force. But 
the Africans stood upon the quarter-deck of the Amistad as its 
masters ; they commanded, and these " Spanish gentlemen " 
obeyed ; they frowned, and these " Spanish gentlemen " trem- 
bled before them. 

Sir, the day has come when this idea of property in man 
should be scouted from this hall, and from all Christian nations ; 
no force, no barbarity, no enactment, no human power can 
transform men into chattels. 

These people were at no time slaves under the laws of 
Cuba. They had been imported in violation of the laws of 
Spain, and in violation of her treaty obligation, and could not 
at any time have been recognized as slaves in any court of 
Cuba, or of Spain ; yet for the sake of the argument, I will 
suppose them to have been imported, prior to the treaty with 
Great Britain, and in pursuance of the laws of Spain, and to 
have been held as slaves under the laws of Cuba ; and that 
while thus held, they had made their escape in the manner 



84 TIIE AMISTAD NEGROES. 

they did ; and to have landed upon our shores, and have sought 
our hospitality. Would we have delivered them up to their 
masters ? Is there any principle in the law of nature, or the 
law of nations ; in the comity of nations ; in our treaty stipu- 
lations, requiring us to do so base an act ? 

Sir, the practice of all civilized nations is opposed to such 
practice. No monarch of Europe would have suffered them to 
be surrendered under such circumstances. Every principle of 
good faith, of hospitality, forbids it. When strangers come to 
our shores, they are entitled to hospitality, to security. We 
have recently entered into express treaty stipulations with 
England, to deliver up criminals who escape from justice there, 
and come to this country. But we did not surrender malefac- 
tors until the law of nations had been thus modified by treaty ; 
and we do it now with no other nation, and no other nation 
does it with us. 

Suppose a serf should escape from Russia and come among 
us, and his master should follow and demand him. Shall we 
institute an inquiry into the law of serfdom, — the relation be- 
tween the noble and his serf, — and then determine that one is 
property, and the other owner ? This committee should have 
learned the Law of Nations from the practice, the experience 
we have had on this identical question. 

Those gentlemen cannot have forgotten the fact, that many 
of our slave-ships have been wrecked on British islands ; but, 
I ask, did British authorities or British law, ever surrender to 
us, or to our slave-holders, a single slave ? Of all that have 
once set foot on British soil, not one has been given up. The 
case of the Creole is too recent to be forgotten by any gentle- 
man. There the negroes slew one of their owners, took forci- 
ble possession of the ship, and landed on British soil, and were 
free. But did Britain surrender them ? Why, Sir, our Secre- 
tary of State too well understood the Law of Nations to demand 
them, even under our treaty. Yet this report seeks to over- 
throw this law of nations, this universal practice among all 
civilized governments. It urges that these Africans should 
have been delivered over to the slave-dealers. I will not sane- 



THE AMISTAD NEGROES. 85 

tion these doctrines of the committee, by voting to send them 
among the people. I think it would be an unprofitable and 
disgraceful expenditure. 

■ The committee, however, feeling a want of confidence in their 
positions, quote the eighth, ninth, and tenth articles of our 
treaty with Spain in 1795, to justify their positions. They 
very carefully avoid specifying which of those sections they 
rely upon. By the article first referred to, this government 
covenanted to permit Spanish vessels, driven into our ports by 
stress of weather, by pirates or enemies, to depart with their 
people. Now what connection there is between the provisions 
of this section and the case under consideration, I am unable to 
discover. No Spanish vessel was driven to our ports by stress 
of weather, or by pirates. We have not refused permission to 
any such vessel to depart. We have neither detained such 
vessel, nor the people who belonged to such vessel. Nor do 
the committee allege that we have. Why this section was 
quoted to sustain the doctrines of the report, I think is a question 
which neither the committee nor any other member can answer. 

The ninth section provides, that we will deliver to their 
Spanish owners, all ships and merchandise rescued out of the 
hands of pirates- or robbers. Now, what connection there is 
between " the ship, and merchandise on board of it," and the 
paying of these claimants for negroes, is a matter not very 
apparent to my mind. Neither the bill, nor the report, speaks 
of any claim to the ship, or to the merchandise on board. They 
both refer to these negroes, and propose to pay seventy thou- 
sand dollars for them, not for the ship, nor for her merchandise ; 
and I am not able to see any connection whatever between 
this section of the treaty and the claim before us. 

The last article quoted, refers only to the payment of charges 
and dues, when vessels of either nation shall be under the 
necessity of repairing in the ports of the other. This section 
unquestionably has just as much relation to the subject of pay- 
ing for negroes, as either of the others. The author of the 
report appears to have been unwilling to point to either section 
in particular, as creating any liability applicable to this case ; 

8 



86 THE AMISTAD NEGROES. 

but refers to them all collectively, as though the reader might 
be able to discover some connection which the committee were 
unable to discern. 

But, Sir, the judicial branch of our government has had this 
whole matter before them, and have made a solemn decision 
of each question. They were unanimously of opinion that 
neither section had any reference to this subject, and the 
committee now appear anxious to reverse that decision. As 
already stated, I regard such legislation as incompatible with 
our duty. 

There is, however, another point in this report, to which 
I desire to call the attention of the House. For the pur- 
pose of giving color to the claim of these slave-dealers, the 
committee evidently felt the necessity of establishing some new 
principle in the law of nations ; some doctrine unknown to the 
■ savans and jurists who have written upon the principles of 
international law. In order to do this, they quote certain reso- 
lutions adopted by the Senate of the United States in 1840. I 
am bound to speak of that body with respect; yet I am bound 
to speak of their doings agreeably to the dictates of truth. 
These resolutions were adopted under circumstances, which 
must forever excite doubts as to the correctness of their doc- 
trines. The slave-ship " Enterprise," had entered " Port Ham- 
ilton," in the British island of Bermuda, in distress. The slaves 
went on shore, and were free. Our President did not demand 
the surrender of the slaves, but the price of their bodies. The 
British authorities refused payment ; and a distinguished slave- 
holding senator (Mr. Calhoun) introduced to the considera- 
tion of that body, a series of resolutions professing to declare 
the law of nations in such cases. I am aware that this code is 
said to be often modified by treaty between two or more 
nations ; and it is too plain to require illustration, that in similar 
cases this international code may be modified, so far as those 
nations who are parties to the treaty are concerned. But I 
think all will admit it is a novel doctrine that one nation can, 
by its own act, so change or modify this international code, as 
to affect the interest, or the rights, of any other nation ; yet the 



THE AMISTAD NEGROES. 87 

Senate of these United States made the attempt. That body 
gravely took into consideration and adopted the following reso- 
lutions : 

" 1. That a ship or vessel on the high seas, in time of peace, engaged in a 
lawful voyage, is, according to the laws of nations, under the exclusive juris- 
diction of the State to which her flag belongs — as much so as if constituting a 
part of its own domains. 

" 2. That if such a ship or vessel should be forced by stress of weather, or 
other unavoidable cause, into the port and under the jurisdiction of a friendly 
power, she and her cargo, and persons onboard, with their property, and all the' 
rights belonging to their personal relations, as established by the laws of the • 
State to which they belong, would be placed under the protection which the 
laws of nations extend to the unfortunate under such circumstances.* 

" 3. That the brig Enterprise, which was forced unavoidably by stress of 
weather into Port Hamilton, Bermuda island, while on a lawful voyage on the 
high seas, from one port of the Union to another, comes within the principles 
embraced in the foregoing resolutions ; and that the seizure and detention of 
the negroes on board by the local authority of the island, was an act in viola- 
tion of the laws of nations, and highly unjust to our own citizens to whom 
they belong." 

I am not prepared to adopt these resolutions as an exposition 
of the law of nations. They are distinctly opposed to the 
principles of that code, as understood and expounded from the 
earliest writers upon international law to the present day. No 
writer ever intimated such principles as having found a place 
in the law of nations ; and when introduced to the Senate, they 
were novel and unheard of. 

Mr. Ingersoll. They are regarded as law by all civilized 
nations. 

Mr. Giddings. I aver that up to the time of their intro- 
duction to the Senate, nor since that time, has any writer upon, 
the law of nations advanced such doctrines ; and I defy the 



*It may be proper here to say, that Mr. Calhoun's State, (South Carolina,)] 
notwithstanding this resolution, practically disregards its doctrines. The im- 
prisonment of a freeborn British subject, Manuel Pereira, for no crime, who> 
was driven by stress of weather into the port of Charleston in the year 1852,. 
shows that they paid no respect to the laws of England, or to the rights of her 
subjects. The " local authori ties " of South Carolina imprisoned Pereira for 
the color of his skin ; and the recent message of the Governor of that State 
insists upon the enforcement of this regulation, whatever may be the conse- 
quences. 



88 THE AMISTAD NEGROES. 

gentleman to produce any author avowing such principles. 
I speak with great confidence ; and if the gentleman can pro- 
duce such author, I will most cheerfully confess my error before 
the House and the country. 

Mr. Ingersoll. The Chamber of Deputies in France has 
very lately recognized the same principles. 

Mr. Giddings. I would far rather see the official report, 
before I lend full credence to the charge of their having so 
widely departed from the established law of nations. So con- 
scious were a number of senators that these resolutions_were in 
conflict with the recognized principles of international law, that 
they would not vote for them. 

Mr. Ingersoll. It was an unanimous vote. 

Mr. Giddings. I am aware that all of the senators who 
voted, were in favor of their adoption ; yet there were but 
thirty-three votes given, while there were fifty-two members. 

Mr. Ingersoll. They were all present. 

Mr. Giddings. I feel humbled under the allusion of the 
gentleman. If the senators were present, as he states, and 
silently permitted these resolutions to be adopted by the slave- 
holding portion of that body, aided by their northern " allies" 
they are responsible to the country, to their constituents, and to 
posterity. It is not for me to come forward as their accuser. 
To their own masters they must stand or fall. Yet I cannot 
but regret that honorable senators from the free States should 
have permitted such resolutions to find a place on the journal 
of that body, without opposition. It was unworthy of the 
American Senate.* 

I can very clearly discover good reasons why senators should 
have refused to vote for the resolutions ; but I can discern none 
whatever for not voting. The first resolution is a truism. It 
merely states that — 

" A ship pursuing a lawful voyage, while on the ' high seas,' is under the 
exclusive jurisdiction of the State to which her flag belongs." 

* But one whig senator from the free States is said to have voted on this 
occasion. He was from Ehode Island. He and every senator who voted, 
recorded their names in the affirmative. 



THE AMISTAD NEGROES. 89 

The word " State " has reference to the government to which 
her flag belongs ; as the States of this Union have no flags, nor 
have they any jurisdiction upon the " high seas." 

I deny that the Amistad was engaged in a " lawful voyage." 
She had on hoard fifty-two Africans, imported to Cuba in vio- 
lation of the laws of Spain and of her treaty obligations. The 
ship was engaged in completing the original voyage, by which 
these persons were imported, as much as she would have been 
had she taken them on board at " Fernando Po." Her voyage 
was as much piratical as was that of the ship which brought 
them from Africa; and she was liable to the same penalties 
and forfeitures. She was not under the jurisdiction of Spain ; 
for she had set at defiance Spanish laws and Spanish treaties. 
Nor was her voyage lawful in any sense of that term. This 
case, therefore, does not come within the scope of these resolu- 
tions. 

The Africans were neither slaves in law, nor slaves in fact. 
They had been torn from their homes and their friends, in vio- 
lation of all law, by pirates, who were entitled to no other 
treatment than that which was due to their crimes. The 
opportunity was presented for them to regain their liberty. 
They owed it to themselves, to their country, to their descend- 
ants, to free themselves as soon as they had power to do so. 
No considerations of mercy to their oppressors ought to have 
detained them one moment from the assertion of their freedom, 
even at the expense of every white man on board. They rose,, 
asserted their rights, and became masters of the ship. They 
were thousands of miles from their native land, from which 
they had been torn by the rapacious slave-dealers. Montez 
and Ruiz had been aware of all the outrages which had been; 
committed against these people at the time they purchased, 
them. They had thus made themselves parties to the crimes 
of those who imported them from Africa, and, in all respects, 
stood in the same situation morally which those importers 
would have stood in, had they continued on board the Amistad. 
And can any man doubt the right of Cinquez and his associates 
to employ the ship, and compel Montez and Ruiz to navigate it 
8* 



90 THE AMISTAD NEGROES. 

back to Africa? In doing this, they obeyed the dictates of 
nature's law, offended against no principle of the law of nations 
or of Spain. The Spanish slavers, while bringing them from 
Africa, and in carrying them to Principe, were "outlaws" 
entitled to no protection from any nation, nor from the laws of 
any nation. While on shore in Africa, nor while on the " high 
seas," was there any law to shield them from the vengeance of 
those they held in chains. Had their victims bravely risen at 
any time and turned the ship's head toward Africa, and car- 
ried their captors there and sold them into slavery and kept 
the ship for their own use, no law would have been violated 
thereby. 

It would give me pleasure to hear from the author of this 
report on these positions, and also as to the moral duty of those 
Africans. Were they bound in conscience to remain in chains, 
while they had the power to regain their freedom ? Or, after 
they had taken possession of the ship, were they bound to go 
on to " Principe " and quietly be made slaves ? What would 
the honorable chairman of this committee have done, had he 
been in their situation ? I hope he may give us light on the 
subject. 

And, when that gentleman takes the floor, I beg his atten- 
tion to another question. If these Africans, while returning to 
their native land, had found it necessary to call at the island of 
" Fernando Po " for water, would the people of that island have 
possessed the right, under the law of nations, to take their ship 
from them ? To me, these questions appear of easy solution. 
I regard the ship, in this case, to have been as clearly and 
absolutely the property of Cinquez and his associates as any 
ship captured by Americans in the late war with Great Britain 
was the property of the captors. 

Slavery itself, in its most legal form, is nothing less than a 
state of war between masters and servants. It is so defined by 
our ablest writers. It is guided .by no law of nature or of 
nature's God. It is in conflict with both. The only mode of 
reducing a man to slavery is by brute force, the only power 
known in a state of war. These Spaniards, when they went to 



THE AMISTAD NEGROES. Dl 

Africa, could have been justified by no law of human enact- 
ment. Had these persons been imported prior to the treaty 
between Spain and Great Britain, and according to Spanish 
law, yet no decree or law of the Spanish Crown could have 
imposed any moral diity whatever upon them, to submit to 
their captors. On the contrary, had the whole physical power 
of Spain been exerted to prevent their return to freedom, they 
would have been fully justified in asserting their liberty, although 
it had cost the life of every man of that nation. 

We live at a period of time, when the vague superstitions of 
ignorance and of a barbarous age can no longer mislead the 
enlightened consciences of men. Slavery is not only a state of 
war, but it is itself a crime, which no human enactment can 
sanction or modify. We may pass such laws as we please, 
authorizing certain persons to buy and sell the image of God. 
We may authorize the worst form of piracy known to man, so 
far as human enactments can authorize them ; yet those who 
commit these crimes are in no degree justified before God or 
good men. By such enactments, we, who make the law, 
become participators in the guilt and the crimes which we 
encourage by such laws. 

These considerations lead me to the satisfactory conclusion, 
that these Africans committed no moral error in taking posses- 
sion of the ship, and in striving to return to their native land. 
I think no man will deny that, by every principle of interna- 
tional law and of natural justice, the ship and cargo was theirs, 
for every purpose necessary to carry them back to Africa. 
For that purpose, they had the perfect right to use the ship 
and the provisions on board, and the money belonging to Mon- 
tez and Ruiz, that may have been, with perfect justice and 
propriety, expended by them, if necessary to carry them back 
to their native land. And I will go still further, and say they 
had a perfect right to compel Montez and Ruiz, and the crew 
of the ship, to labor in working it, so far as necessary to land 
them on the soil from whence they had been taken. 

These Africans had possession of the ship and of her cargo. 



92> THE AMISTAD NEGROES. 

They had the power over Montez and Ruiz, — were compel- 
ling them to guide the ship ; were in every possible way 
endeavoring to return to the land of their nativity, when they 
approached our shores. They came to us peaceably and qui- 
etly. They wanted a supply of water and provisions. They 
were entitled to our hospitality, our friendship, and our sympa- 
thy. They came within the scope of our laws, and were thus 
subjected to our jurisdiction. Under these laws, they could not 
hold the Spaniards in slavery, nor compel them to go further 
on the voyage ; but our laws did not interfere with their right 
to the ship or to the cargo. The interest which the Afri- 
cans held in them was not affected by our laws. 

Here I meet the doctrine of the second resolution of the 
Senate. The law of nations has fixed the boundaries of every 
government at a marine league from shore. All civilized 
nations understand this rule, and conform to it. All rivers, 
bays, and harbors, are within the jurisdiction of the govern- 
ment, and to the extent of a marine league into the sea. All 
writers on international law have fixed this as the rule, and no 
exceptions were ever made to it, until the adoption of this reso- 
lution of the Senate. 

When a ship leaves England, she continues to be governed 
by English laws while upon the high seas. Her captain, crew, 
and passengers, know no other. They are controlled by no 
other. They will permit no foreigner to enter on board, unless 
invited; will exhibit no papers to such foreigner, and hold 
themselves subject to no other power. But, when they reach 
our waters, and come within a marine league of our shore, our 
pilots, our revenue officers, and our health officers, go on board ; 
they examine passports, bills of health, bills of lading, &c. &c. 
Those on board then submit to our laws entirely. And such 
has been the case from time immemorial, is now, and will con- 
tinue to be, these resolutions of the Senate to the contrary not- 
withstanding. 

The attempt of the Slave Power to change that law by sena- 
torial resolution, to my view, appears rather ludicrous than 



THE AMISTAD NEGROES- 93 

serious, as diminishing the influence of that body, rather than 
changing or modifying the law of nations. With these princi- 
ples before them, the Senate resolved that, — 

" A ship, driven by stress of weather within the jurisdiction of a friendly- 
power, carries with her the laws of the government under whose flag she sails ; 
and that the persons on board; and their relations to each other, as established 
by such laws, are to be protected by the government within whose jurisdiction 
she seeks safety." 

How far this effort of senators will affect the principles of 
international law, remains to be seen.* At this time, I believe 
no other nation has recognized this extraordinary doctrine, nor 
do I believe any other nation, or even this nation, ever will 
adopt it. I do not believe this House will ever stultify itself 
by asserting principles so much at war with the common sense 
of mankind. Yet the Committee on Foreign Affairs appear to 
have received it as a sound exposition of international law. 
The report says : 

" Thus, wherever the flag goes, the country is. hi whatever distant seas or 
foreign ports, wherever the national flag floats, there is the nation. Spain, 
therefore, with all her laws, reigned on board the Amistad as much at sea, and 
in Connecticut or New York, as at Havana." 

Sir, who believes that the Spanish laws of slavery were in 
force on board the Amistad, while in Connecticut and in New 
York ? By the laws of Cuba, the master may flog his slave, 
may sell him. Would the authorities of New York look on 
and see a Spanish slave-holder flog his slaves or commit vio- 
lence upon them? Would they listen to the shrieks of the 
slave, in such case, and remain silent ? Or, if the master in 
New York were to sell his slave agreeably to the laws of 
Cuba, would the transfer be legal ? Is New York liable to be 
converted into a " slave-market " in that way ? If the slave 
resist the violence of the master in Cuba, the master may shoot 
him down. If he do it at the wharf in New York, would the 
people there look on with their arms folded, saying, " it is done 
under Spanish laws" or would they say, in the words of this 

* It is believed that no further effort whatever has been put forth by our 
Executive to induce any nation to recognize the doctrine of these resolutions. 



94 THE AMISTAD NEGROES. 

report, the act was committed in Spam, for Spain is at our 

WHARF ? 

Agreeably to this doctrine, a Brazilian slave-ship fastens to 
a wharf in New York. The people of that city go on board, 
find the decks stowed full of emaciated, starving Africans, suf- 
fering all the horrors incident upon that disgusting traffic. 
Those who appear too far gone to be regarded as profitable 
stock are thrown overboard while yet in life ; those who exhibit 
signs of discontent, are flogged ; and those who resist, are shot 
down, or murdered with a bowie-knife or cutlass. This is all 
done at the wharf, in plain view of the people. But the Bra- 
zilian flag floats at the mast. Brazil is there, and Brazilian 
laws are in force, and the people must permit these "much 
abused slave-dealers " to be guided by their own sense of jus- 
tice. 

Sir, suppose a slave-ship from South Carolina, or any other 
sister State, were to enter the port of Boston from stress of 
weather, would the laws of Massachusetts lend their protection 
to the slave-dealers ? If the slaves should rise in a body, and 
come on shore in pursuit of their freedom, would the officers of 
that State, or the people of Boston, be bound to pursue such 
fugitives through the streets of that city ? Or, if in pursuit of 
freedom, they were to seek sanctuary in " Fanueil Hall," that 
old cradle of liberty, would the good people of that patriotic 
commonwealth seize them and drag them forth, replace them 
on board the slave-ships, and deliver them over to the tender 
mercies of piratical dealers in human flesh ? If they were to 
lend their protection to the personal relations of those on board, 
as established by the laws of South Carolina, they must do 
this ; yet I cannot believe that any slave-holding senator, who 
gave his vote in favor of these resolutions, would advocate such 
doctrine before the country ; nor do I believe that any northern 
senator, who sat in silence when that vote was taken, would 
now publicly admit the correctness of such doctrines. 

It was a most unfortunate attempt of the Senate to change 
the law of nations. They overstepped the bounds of their 
power and of their influence. They will regret the vote. 



THE AMISTAD NEGROES. 95 

Their descendants, in coming time, will blush, when they read 
the record of that act. 

Sir, the year preceding these transactions on board the 
Amistad, a Captain "YVendall was on board his vessel in the 
port of Havana. He was- an American, commanding an Amer- 
ican ship, and the American flag was flying at his mast ; and, 
of course, according to this report, "this nation was there." 
This captain was charged with having treated his mate with 
great inhumanity. He was taken from on board his ship, and 
imprisoned under Spanish laws and by Spanish authority, and 
was detained in prison for a long time. A full representation 
was made to Congress, but no member of this House then felt 
that it was an outrage upon our national rights, nor was the 
doctrine of these resolutions then thought of. Even the grave 
senators who adopted these resolutions were then silent. They 
did not at that time appear to have become conscious of the 
existence of those great principles which were subsequently 
called forth in favor of slave-merchants. Their lips were her- 
metically sealed, when our citizens, in the pursuit of an honor- 
able commerce, were rendered subject to Spanish laws. The 
idea that our laws were in force at Havana, that our nation 
was there, had not then entered the minds of senators. 

These efforts to sustain slavery and the slave-trade, are 
becoming a reproach to our nation. They are bringing our 
government into disrepute among Christian nations. This 
desire of public men to lend governmental influence in support 
of the slave-trade and of slavery, is rendering us " a hissing 
and a by-word among enlightened nations." There appears to 
be no absurdity in favor of oppression that does not find sup- 
porters ; while the advocates of liberty are timid, faltering, and 
generally silent. 

"We have been called to legislate in favor of the slave-dealers 
of our own land. We have been asked to pay them for slaves 
lost and for slaves stolen ; but never, until this report was 
made, has Congress been called on to pay foreigners for their 
losses while dealing in huma/i flesh. I have felt it my duty to 
meet this proposition at the threshold, and to oppose it with 



96 THE AMISTAD NEGROES. 

what energy and influence I possess. I have done so, knowing 
the feeling arrayed against me ; but the country, the people of 
this wide-spread Kepublic, now and hereafter, will pronounce 
judgment upon those attempts to prostitute our powers to the 
support of a commerce in our own species. For these reasons, 
I felt unwilling to give a silent vote upon the motion before the 
House.* 

* After the adjournment of Congress in 1844, Hon. John Quincy Adams 
published the speech he intended to deliver in the House, in case the motion to 
print extra copies of this report had been insisted on. 



ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 



DESIGNS OF ITS ADVOCATES — PAYMENT OF HER DEBTS — OBJECTIONS TO 
THAT MEASURE — GUARANTIES OF SLAVERY — RIGHTS OF THE SEVERAL 
STATES. 

[In 1837, the authorities of Texas applied to the Executive of the United 
States for annexation to our Union. The President, Mr. Van Buren, considering 
such act unconstitutional, rejected the proposition. In 1843, rumors were cir- 
culated that the philanthropists of England were seeking to abolish slavery in 
Texas. This appears to have aroused President Tyler and his cabinet, who 
immediately commenced a correspondence with the authorities of Texas, upon 
the propriety of their uniting with us, and becoming a member of our federal 
Union. The reasons assigned by the Secretary of State in his letter of instruc- 
tions was, the apprehension that Texas would abolish slavery through the 
influence of Great Britain, and that the institution in our Southern States 
would thereby be endangered. It was further urged that Texas, if annexed to 
our Union, would furnish an outlet for the surplus slave population of the 
slave-growing States. A treaty for annexation was soon negotiated, but doubts 
were entertained as to its ratification by the Senate. In this state of the ques- 
tion, southern members of the House were endeavoring to prepare the public 
mind for the consummation of their object, by making speeches in favor of the 
measure, while northern men were silent on the subject. The following 
remarks were the first uttered against it in the House of Representatives. Mr. 
Giddings obtained the floor late in the day, with the expectation that the com- 
mittee would then rise ; but they refused, and he proceeded in his remarks 
without having any notes before him, or even the documents to which he 
referred.] 

Mr. Chairman, — I rise to call the attention of gentlemen 
to the real questions involved in this issue, now before the 
country. Texas is a revolted State of the Mexican Republic, 
carrying on a war against the federal power of which she was 

* Speech upon the Naval Appropriation Bill. Delivered in Committee of 
the whole House on the state of the Union, May 21, 1844. 

9 



98 ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 

formerly a member. Her revolt was occasioned principally by 
a law of the Mexican Congress, which abolished the institution 
of slavery throughout the different States of that confederacy. 
In order to retain her slavery, she declared herself indepen- 
dent, and it is sought now to annex her to our Union, for the 
purpose of aiding the people of that State in sustaining sla- 
very, and also for obtaining a market for the surplus slave 
population of our own States. 

This real issue has been formed. It has been placed upon 
the records of our government, and will go down to coming 
generations for inspection ; it has been published in our news- 
papers ; it is already before the people, who are to try and 
to determine the question. The President, his Cabinet, and a 
portion of this House, aver, in substance, that this federal 
government shall take upon itself the burden of sustaining 
and perpetuating slavery in Texas; and of the slave-trade 
between our slave-breeding States and the people of that 
government. If we comply with their demands, our army and 
navy are to be employed, and our energies as a nation put 
forth ; our character is to be disgraced for the attainment of 
this object ; we are to violate our faith, pledged to Mexico by 
treaty stipulation ; acknowledge ourselves hypocritical pretend- 
ers to freedom ; dishonor the memory of our revolutionary 
sires, and wage an unrelenting war upon human nature. 

Against this policy are arrayed the advocates of liberty and 
of justice. They steadily and firmly oppose these measures, 
motives, and designs, and every member must take position on 
one side or the other. 

The annexation of Texas is urged upon us as the proposed 
means of extending and perpetuating slavery therein ; but the 
ulterior and important design, I think, is most obviously to 
enhance the price of human flesh in our slave-breeding States, 
by opening up a slave-market in Texas. This object is most 
clearly apparent in the correspondence between the Secretary 
of State and our minister at London ; between the Secretary 
of State and our " Charge de Affairs " in Texas ; and in the 
correspondence between that officer and the British minister 



ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 99 

resident in this city. The same object is avowed by most of 
the papers south of Mason and Dixon's line. It is also appa- 
rent in the public addresses put forth by almost every political 
meeting in the slave States, called to consider this question. It 
was fully and frankly avowed by the gentleman from South 
Carolina, (Mr. Holmes,) who spoke yesterday, and by the gen- 
tleman from Virginia, (Mr. Atkinson,) and the gentleman from 
Alabama, (Mr. Belser,) both of whom spoke to-day. These 
gentlemen met the issue frankly and fairly. Not so with the 
gentleman from Indiana, (Mr. Owen.) He is from a free State, 
and appeared to be embarrassed while advocating the interests 
of slave-breeders and slave-dealers ; but he spoke learnedly of 
treaties, of governments " de facto" and of governments " de 
jure." 

There are objections to the annexation of Texas, which meet 
us at the very threshold of the argument. When it is pro- 
posed by the people of Texas to erase the name of that repub- 
lic from the list of nations ; to surrender their existence as a 
separate, independent people ; and to place themselves under 
the government of the United States ; we know there must be 
an object, an actuating motive, that induces them thus to merge 
their nationality with the people of these States. These objects 
are all set forth in the treaty now under discussion in the other 
end of this capitol. The first of those objects to which I will 
call the attention of the committee, is the payment of their debts 
by the people of this Union. This is one of the conditions of 
the treaty, without which the people of Texas would not listen 
to any proposition for annexation. 

To this there are some strong objections. A portion of the 
representatives in this hall, are desirous that the people of our 
free States shall contribute of their hard earnings some ten 
millions of dollars, to satisfy the debts of slave-holding, repu- 
diating Texas. To this proposition the whigs, both North and 
South, object.* The President, the southern democrats, and 



* Mr. Brown, a whig of Tennessee, subseqiiently introduced the resolutions 
of annexation into the House, and eight southern whigs voted for them. Mr. 



100 ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 

the gentleman from Indiana, urge its propriety, and insist that 
it is the duty of our people to pay the debts of Texas, in order 
to continue slavery there, and to provide a market for our 
slave-breeding States. 

And now what say our democrats of New England and 
New York and Ohio ? I call upon them to come forth and 
express their views ; I hope they will play the man, meet the 
issue fairly, and let us have no dodging. We shall soon return 
to our constituents, and must meet this question before the 
people. Will the gentleman from Indiana then stand forth 
frankly and say to the democrats of his district, " you must 
work hard, and live cheap, and be economical, for we have 
agreed to pay the debts of Texas, and every laboring man in 
the nation must contribute a portion of his earnings ?"* And 
then suppose the honest farmer, in the true Yankee style, should 
inquire for the benefits which this nation are to derive from the 
payment of this sum to Texas; will that gentleman frankly 
and boldly declare to him, that, by paying that amount of 
money, we have established slavery and a first-rate slave-mar- 
ket there ? I cannot distrust that gentlemen's sincerity, and 
yet I think he would rather talk of some other points, and 
leave these important considerations out of view, as he has 
done here to-day. I could not wonder at the policy which he 
manifested ; particularly as his State is unable to pay the inter- 
est on her own debts, I had no right to expect him to speak of 
his anxiety to tax his constituents to pay the debts of Texas. 
How is it with the democrats of the other States, which are 
unable to meet their engagements ? Will they insist upon 
paying the debts of Texas, and leave their own States to be 
dishonored by repudiation ? Has Pennsylvania more interest 



Foster, a whig senator from the same State, introduced them into the Senate, 
and three whig Senators voted for them. 

* The advocates for annexing Texas were unwilling to make any express 
stipulation for paying the debts of Texas in the resolution? of annexation, 
while the question was pending. But the fraud was consummated by one of 
the compromise acts of 1850, under pretence of paying Texas for that portion 
of New Mexico lying east of the Rio Grande. A more stupendous fraud was 
probably never committed upon the American people. 



ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 101 

in maintaining the slave-trade than she has in maintaining her 
own honor? Will the democrats of that State forget their own 
indebtedness, and spend their money to perpetuate slavery in 
Texas, and open up new slave-markets there ? 

I wish the American people to understand that they are 
made to pay for suppressing the slave-trade on the African 
coast, and at the same time they are to be to an indefinite 
amount taxed to maintain and encourage it on the American 
coast. I should be pleased to hear the eloquent gentleman 
from Indiana (Mr. Owen) explain to his constituents the pre- 
cise line on which this slave-trade changes its character ; on 
the East of which it is the most detestable of crimes, and 
West of which it becomes a laudable commerce, worthy of our 
fostering care. It is due to each member who really desires to 
open this slave-trade between our slave-breeding States and 
Texas, that they stand forth before this body and before the 
country, and, like the honorable Secretary of State, frankly 
avow their object. 

I repeat that the object of this annexation on our part is dis- 
tinctly avowed to be, the perpetuation of slavery in Texas, and 
the establishment of a market for the surplus slaves of our 
Southern States. There is no doubt that it will greatly enhance 
the price of human flesh in this district, and in all the northern 
slave States. 

Texas is also engaged in a war with Mexico, and w r ants us 
to fight her battles. The maintenance of that w r ar may also 
involve us in hostilities with England. It certainly will with 
Mexico. And our constituents from the free States will be 
called on to go forth to maintain this slave-trade uj)on the field 
of battle. Our people are brave and generous in a good cause. 
But will this war in favor of oppression and crime, be of such 
character that we can conscientiously look to heaven for its 
blessing to rest upon our arms ? On the contrary, we are con- 
scious that the " Almighty has no attribute which will permit 
him to take sides with us in such a contest." These battles 
must be fought by northern men principally, for southern men 
will be constrained to remain at home to watch their slaves. 
9* 



102 ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 

It is a historical fact, that, in 1780, South Carolina sent a spe- 
cial agent to Congress, to inform that body that their State 
could furnish no troops for the defence of the nation, " as it 
had become necessary for their men to remain at home to pro- 
tect their families from anticipated insurrections of slaves." 

It would gratify me to have some advocate of this policy 
stand forth and describe that love of oppression and of crime, 
that contempt for his race and of God's law, which would 
induce him to die upon the battle-field, fighting to establish a 
more profitable market for the slaves reared in Maryland and 
Virginia. If a constituent of mine were to fall in such a 
cause, amid the carnage of battle ; his life's blood fast flowing 
from mortal wounds ; his countenance pale and distorted with 
pain, with no friendly hand to minister to his wants, or wipe 
the cold sweat of death from his brow, I do not believe he 
would draw very rich consolation from the reflection that he 
died fighting to extend the slave-trade, to perpetuate the most 
revolting crimes which man is capable of committing. 

Our sailors, too, will be anxious to have this longitudinal 
line, which fixes the character of the slave-trade, distinctly 
drawn. To them it would be important to know the precise 
point in going East, at which they are to cease fighting in 
favor of this slave-trade, and to commence fighting against it. 
If he falls in battle fighting in favor of it, on our own coast, 
what consolations are to smoothe his pathway through the dark 
valley of the shadow of death ? But if he dies on the African 
coast, contending against those pirates who deal in God's 
image, he will of course be told that he falls in the discharge 
of duty. We have been taught to regard justice as univer- 
sally the same in all places. But this new philosophy teaches 
us that it has become versatile, changing with the longitude in 
which it is administered. The time has come when Western 
justice is to be regarded as synonymous with slavery and the 
slave-trade, and Eastern justice is to be expressive of liberty 
and freedom. Ancient philosophy taught us to look upon jus- 
tice as eternal; but these advocates of annexation are about to 
fix the time, when it is to change, and be viewed as antagonist 



ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 103 

to its former character. They speak of extending American 
liberty to Texas, by founding it upon perpetual slavery, and 
insist that, by establishing the most degrading oppression 
there, we shall carry to that people the enjoyment of true 
democratic principles. I was delighted with the eulogium of 
the gentleman from Indiana, (Mr. Owen,) upon democratic 
liberty. While urging the duty of annexation, he spoke in 
thrilling terms of the effulgent glory of our American institu- 
tions, including slavery and the slave-trade. Those poetic 
strains may delight the ears of slave-breeders and slave-deal- 
ers ; but I have mistaken the character of our northern people, 
if eloquence itself can lead them to forget the fundamental 
principles of freedom. 

The principal burdens of this war, in case of annexation, 
must rest upon the people of our present Union. This will 
surely be very acceptable to the people of Texas. They 
are willing to buy negroes from our slave-breeding States, pro- 
vided we will furnish an army to protect them while they 
remain on their plantations, and scourge their slaves into sub- 
jection, according to the true principles of liberty as expounded 
by the present Secretary of State.* The Executive and his 
cabinet, and the advocates of annexation, appear to think that 
this purchase of a slave-market will be highly advantageous. 
And now I wish to know what our northern democrats think 
of it? We know that the whigs are opposed to it. "f" And I 
ask the democrats whether they are prepared to go to Texas, 
and stand sentinel there, and defend the fugitive criminals of 
that country, provided they will condescend to purchase the 
slaves of Virginia?! 

What say our democrats of New England, of Maine, of 

* Mr. Calhoun, Secretary of State, in his instructions to our minister at 
Paris, avows that the object of our government in seeking the annexation of. 
Texas, is to perpetuate slavery, and thereby establish liberty. 

t At the time this speech was delivered, the whigs were professedly opposed 
to the extension of slavery. 

\ It is well known that many of the early settlers in Texas, were men who 
fled from the United States to avoid punishment for crimes committed in this 
Kepublic. 



104 ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 

Massachusetts, Connecticut, Vermont, and New Hampshire ? 
I want them to step out boldly, and let us understand their 
true positions. If they are to arrange themselves in favor of 
purchasing this slave-market at such price, I trust they will 
avow it before the world. 

It is well known, Mr. Chairman, that, since the formation of 
this confederacy, there has been a supposed conflict between 
the interests of free labor and of slave labor, between the 
southern and the northern States. I do not say that the con- 
flict is real; I only say that in the minds of the people, both 
North and South, and in this hall, such conflict exists. This 
has given rise to a difference of policy in our national councils. 
I refer to the tariff in particular, as being a favorite measure 
of the North, while free trade is advocated more generally by 
the South. I refer also to our harbor improvements, and the 
improvement of our river navigation, as other measures in 
which the North-west and West have felt great interest, and 
to which the South have been constantly opposed. But so 
equally balanced has been the political power between these 
opposing interests, that for five years past our lake commerce 
has been entirely abandoned ; and such were the defects of the 
tariff, that for many years our revenues were unequal to the 
support of government. 

By the fixed order of nature's law, our population at the 
North has increased so much faster than it has in the slave 
States, that under the late census the North and West hold the 
balance of political power; and at the present session, we 
have passed through this body a bill for the protection of our 
lake and river commerce, which awaits the action of the Sen- 
ate to become a law. But let us admit Texas, and we shall 
place the balance of power in the hands of the Texans. They, 
with the southern States, will control the policy and the des- 
tiny of this nation ; our tariff will then be held at the will of 
the Texan advocates of free trade. Are our friends of the 
North prepared to deliver over this policy to the people of 
Texas? Are the liberty-loving democrats of Pennsylvania 
ready to give up the tariff? To strike off all protection from 



ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 105 

the articles of iron and coal and other productions of that 
State, in order to purchase a slave-market for their neighbors, 
who, in the words of Thomas Jefferson Randolph, " breed men 
for the market like oxen for the shambles ?"* 

I do not argue to the policy of protecting our American 
manufactures. I only say, that at this time, New England 
and the free States generally are in favor of it, while the 
slave States are equally opposed to it. And I ask, are the 
mechanics and manufacturers of the North prepared to aban- 
don their employments, in order that slave-markets may be 
established in Texas, and a brisk traffic in the bodies, the 
flesh and blood of our southern population may be main- 
tained ? Are the farmers of the West, of Ohio, Indiana, and 
Illinois, prepared to give up the sale of their beef, pork, and 
flour, in order to increase the profits of those who raise chil- 
dren for sale, and deal in the bodies of women ? Are the free 
States prepared to suspend their harbor and river improve- 
ments for the purpose of establishing this slave-trade with 
Texas, and to perpetuate slavery therein ? f 

But, if Texas be admitted to the Union, it is to be a slave- 
holding State, out of which several States are hereafter to be 
admitted, with the advantages over our free States of holding a 
representation on this floor, and a vote in the election of presi- 
dent and vice-president, and in the administration of the federal 
government, in proportion to the number of slaves they shall 
hold in bondage. In other words, their influence on all these 
subjects is to be proportioned to their contempt of liberty. The 
Texan, who holds five slaves, is to wield an influence over our 
national interests, equal to four of our northern freemen. If 

* The democratic members from Pennsylvania gave their votes for the 
annexation of Texas ; and the members from Texas subsequently gave their 
casting votes hi favor of repealing the duties on iron, which nearly destroyed' 
the iron interests of Pennsylvania. 

t It is a historical fact, that when a bill subsequently passed Congress to 
improve our harbors and our river navigation, President Polk vetoed it, assign- 
ing as a reason therefor, that all the pecuniary means of the nation were re- 
quired to cany on the war between Mexico and the United States, which had 
been assumed by the annexation of Texas to our Union. 



106 ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 

each holds fifty slaves, his influence will be equal to that of tltlrty- 
one of the independent electors of the free States. I ask the 
learned gentleman from Indiana, (Mr. Owen,) if he really esti- 
mates the political worth of his constituents so low as to require 
thirty-one of them to form an aggregate of political influence 
equal to that of the piratical owner of fifty " human chattels " 
in Texas? Or does he estimate his own political worth at 
one fourth part of that which he attaches to the holder of five 
slaves in Texas ? I wish gentlemen here would speak out, 
and let us know the real estimate which they put upon the 
moral and political worth of northern men ? Would to God I 
were able to speak to every man of every party, north of 
Mason and Dixon's line. I would demand of them as men, 
as freemen, to come forward, and let the country understand 
whether any one of them is willing thus to degrade himself; 
or whether any one of them is willing to be thus degraded 
by his representatives in this hall. This proposition, come 
from whom it may, from persons high in office, or from those 
wishing to be high in office, is insulting to northern feeling and 
northern honor. Sir, why not propose at once that our people 
shall surrender themselves as slaves to the Texan planters ? 
Why not advise the people of our free States at once to leave 
their homes, to go to Texas, and become the voluntary " hew- 
ers of wood and drawers of water " to those fugitive criminals, 
who, within the last fifteen years, were driven from the Uni- 
ted States to avoid punishment for their crimes ? 

My main objections to the annexation of Texas, however, 
are confined to the burdens and resulting effects of that policy. 
If she were to come into the Union upon terms of equality 
with our free States, — if her annexation were to promote the 
cause of freedom, most gladly would I have had her as one of 
the States of this confederacy. 

But I must hasten through my subject. I was wholly 
unprepared to address the committee. I had taken no notes, 
nor have I before me books or papers of reference ; but the 
committee appeared anxious to proceed, and I was compelled 
to put to sea, upon the wide ocean of this debate, without 



ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 107 

chart or compass, and with nothing to guide my course hut the 
glittering star of truth, as it shines in the moral firmament, 
unobscured by political clouds. Whether I shall again reach 
the shore, within the brief space allotted me by the rules of 
the House, is of little consequence. I shall probably be com- 
pelled to stop before I can possibly bring my argument to a 
close. 

It is, however, due to myself to say, that I would not have 
occupied the attention of the House one moment, if any other 
northern man had exhibited a disposition to address the com- 
mittee ; but as we have now had some six or eight speeches 
in favor of the annexation of Texas, and not one against it, I 
began to fear that our people of the North would think we 
either have nothing to say, or that we are too delicate to speak 
our sentiments. 

I feel constrained to bestow a passing notice upon the posi- 
tions assumed by the gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. 
Holmes) yesterday, and to-day by the gentleman from Vir- 
ginia, (Mr. Atkinson,) and the gentleman from Alabama (Mr. 
Belser) . It is also one of the positions assumed by the late 
Secretary of State, Mr. Upshur, and by the present Secretary 
of State, Mr. Calhoun, in their correspondence connected with 
the treaty lately sent to the other branch of the National Leg- 
islature. 

The point to which I allude is, — " that the federal govern- 
ment have guaranteed slavery to the southern States of this 
Union ; " and they urge that, in order to carry out such guar- 
anty, it is necessary to annex Texas, lest slavery shall be 
abolished there ; and, in consequence of such abolition in 
Texas, slavery will become valueless in our southern States. 

Now, Mr. Chairman, with all due respect to the legal talents 
and constitutional learning of those gentlemen, I may be per- 
mitted to deny that any guaranty in regard to slavery ever 
found a place in the Federal Constitution. You, Mr. Chair- 
man, will recollect, that when the gentleman from Alabama 
(Mr. Belser) put forth this doctrine, I respectfully inquired of 
him where he found it. He at first answered that he found it 



108 ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 

in common sense ; he next said it was found in common jus- 
tice ; and, lastly, he asserted it was found in the Constitu- 
tion. I then inquired, in what part of the Constitution I 
would find it. To this he replied, that he had not then time to 
inform me. It is true that an hour is a short time for a speech, 
but, as I now see the gentleman in his seat, I give him notice 
that I will surrender to him the necessary time out of my own 
hour, if he will but inform me of the article and section of the 
Constitution in which such doctrine is to be found. In the 
mean time, I must take issue upon the gentleman's assertion, 
that common sense furnishes any proof of such guaranty for the 
continuance of slavery. I deny the assertion. Every princi- 
ple of common sense is opposed to slavery in all its forms ; 
every dictate of common sense is in favor of freedom. I must 
also emphatically deny the assertion of the gentleman, that a 
•guaranty of slavery is to be found in common justice. The 
principles of common justice are at war with the existence of 
slavery ; " common justice " would strike the shackles from 
every slave in our country. Does that gentleman understand 
that " common justice " authorizes him to hold his fellow man 
subservient to his will ? To compel a fellow being, equal in 
natural rights with himself, to labor for the gratification of his 
appetite ? Sir, " common justice " gives to the slave precisely 
the same liberty that it gives to the master. 

"When God " created man free and equal, and endowed him 
with certain inherent and inalienable rights, among which are 
the enjoyment of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness," 
he dealt out to man common justice. But it appears to me 
that the mind must be truly disordered that can find in " com- 
mon justice " any excuse or apology for slavery ; but, appa- 
rently feeling that this position was not a safe one, the gentle- 
man said the guaranty was to be found in the Constitution. 
I will now pause, that he may inform this committee as to the 
section and article in which it exists. 

[Mr. Giddings made a pause, but Mr. Belser sat silent, 
and Mr. G. proceeded.] 

I was fully aware, when I put the question to the gentle- 



ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 109 

man, that he then had not time to find the guaranty of which 
he spoke. I was also conscious that he would not have time 
during my hour to find it. And I now say to the gentleman, 
and to the committee, that his lifetime will be too short to find 
it ; nay, Mr. Chairman, eternity will not disclose it, for it does 
not exist. Yet, Sir, this senseless jargon, — this eternal repe- 
tition concerning the " guaranties of slavery," is daily sound- 
ing in our ears. It is put forth by men of character, and 
those high in office. Sir, the idea that the Constitution 
contains a guaranty of slavery, is an impeachment both of 
the sincerity and the judgment of the framers of that char- 
ter of American liberty ; and I take this occasion to repeat 
my assertion, that no such stipulation exists, or ever did exist 
in that instrument. And standing here, in the presence of so 
many learned and able statesmen of the South, many of whom 
have repeated the unfounded assumption, I call upon any one, 
or all of them, to refer me to any such covenant or stipulation 
in the Constitution. 

Mr. Brengle, of Maryland, stated, that at the formation of 
the Constitution, slavery existed in most of the States, and 
that slaves were regarded as property ; and, in that light, were 
the subject of protection as much as any other property. 

Mr. Giddings. Will the gentleman point me to the section 
in which I may find this guaranty ? 

Mr. Brengle. I don't refer to any section in particular, 
but to the whole instrument. (A laugh.) 

Mr. Giddings. Well, Mr. Chairman, I have finally chased 
this notable guaranty into the region of southern abstractions ; 
but I declare I never came so near finding it before. (Laugh- 
ter.) 

But the gentleman is in error when he supposes that the 
convention who framed the Constitution regarded slaves as 
property. That instrument, in every instance in which it 
refers to slaves, terms them persons^ and Mr. Madison, the 
father of the Constitution, declared in convention that " it 
would be wrong to admit in the Constitution that man can hold 
10 



110 ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 

property in man ; " and not a member of that body appears to 
have dissented from that view. 

Sir, the only instance in which it can be contended that 
Congress possesses the constitutional power to legislate for the 
benefit of slavery, is to be found in the clause relating to fugi- 
tive slaves. Even there, no grant of power to legislate is 
given ; and its existence is denied by our ablest jurists. But 
admitting for the sake of the argument, that Congress may 
legislate for the return of fugitive slaves ; the power must of 
course be confined to that subject, and cannot be extended to 
any other. That clause has express reference to slavery, and, 
of course, excludes the presumption of any other powers upon 
that subject. To sustain this position, I may here cite the 
opinions of all jurists and statesmen who have written upon 
constitutional law. But there is not the least possible color of 
a guaranty to be found in that instrument. We may legislate, 
or refuse to legislate on the subject, as we please. There is 
no guaranty that Congress will ever notice the subject, or act 
upon it in any way. But least of all is there any guaranty 
that the slave shall not run away from his master, or that he 
shall be caught, or even that he shall not kill the master who 
attempts to take him. 

But, I ask, where is the power to annex territory to the 
Union for the purpose of sustaining slavery in a foreign State ? 
To open up new slave-markets ? To assume the war of a 
foreign State ? To use the army and navy, and violate our 
treaties with other governments, for the purpose of perpetua- 
ting an institution which we detest? I denounce all these 
efforts to plunge us into a war, to pour out the treasure and 
the blood of the nation that slavery and the slave-trade may 
flourish, as violations of the Constitution, and of the dearest 
rights of the people. 

I discard the idea of interfering with the institution in any 
of the States. I admit their power to hold slaves, indepen- 
dent of Congress, or of the federal government. Sir, I admit 
your legal right, under the laws of Virginia, to hold your fel- 
low man in bondage. I cannot interfere with that privilege. 



ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. Ill 

But while I do this, I demand an equal respect for the rights 
and privileges of the people of my State. Ohio has an indis- 
putable right to be free and exempt from the support of sla- 
very. To the extent of my influence, of my moral and politi- 
cal power, that right shall be maintained. The citizen of Ohio 
who would involve our people in the turpitude of slavery, is a 
traitor to our interests, to the interests of humanity, and to the 
Constitution. I will not degrade my State, by claiming less 
respect for her rights than I yield to others. Nor will I claim 
for myself less respect than I award to those around me. 

You, Mr. Chairman, have been educated to regard slavery 
as excusable, perhaps right; I have been educated to hate and 
detest it. You cherish it ; I condemn it. You enjoy in your 
own State, the opinions you entertain ; I enjoy the same privi- 
lege in my State. Thus we are each secured in the enjoyment 
of our views. I will not ask this government to compel you 
or your State to share with us the blessings of liberty. Nor 
will I silently permit it to constrain Ohio, or myself, to partici- 
pate with you in the crimes of slavery. 

Fortunately, the Constitution has given to the federal power 
no authority to involve my State in slavery, or yours in its 
abolition. Suppose the people of the free States should 
demand of Congress to annex Mexico to this Union, and 
assume her war against Texas in order to abolish slavery in 
that State? Would not our southern friends resist and de- 
nounce the proposition ? Would they not proclaim it unconsti- 
tutional, and declare that a dissolution of the Union would 
inevitably follow such action ? I think they would ; but with 
far less cause than the North will have to make the same 
declaration, if Texas be annexed, and we assume her war to 
sustain slavery. 

I am aware that the present Secretary of State, and his pre- 
decessor, both say that the "abolition of slavery in Texas will 
endanger its existence in the United States." Suppose that 
position be correct. I reply that slavery is a State institution, 
over which we have no control. If we had, that power cer- 
tainly ought to be exerted for the overthrow of slavery, and not 



112 ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 

for its continuance. But may not the people of the free States 
say with more propriety and more justice, the continuance of 
slavery in Texas will endanger the existence of freedom in our 
Union ; and, therefore, the federal power ought to destroy the 
institution there ? And would it not be a thousand times more 
honorable for this nation to take up arms for liberty, than to 
assume the war of Texas to maintain slavery ? But to estab- 
lish this doctrine, that we are bound to sustain slavery, gentle- 
men say, "if an enemy land upon our shores for the purpose 
of seizing slaves, this government and the free States are bound 
to protect the masters against such enemy." 

We, Sir, are under obligation to protect the people of each 
State " against foreign invasion, and against domestic violence." 
We cannot permit a foreign enemy to invade our soil ; we expel 
such enemy at once ; we do not this to protect slavery, or 
robbery, or any other crime ; but to maintain our territory invi- 
olate, and protect our people. We protect the slave as much 
as we do the master ; we don't stop to inquire the object of the 
enemy ; we don't ask whether he came to seize the whites or 
the blacks, the rich or poor, bond or free, masters or slaves ? 
We drive the enemy from our soil, without reference to slavery. 
We defend the country. 

But for the purpose of showing it to be our duty to sustain 
slavery, it is urged that this government is bound to protect the 
masters in case of insurrection ; and southern men ask, sup- 
pose our slaves rise and murder our people, is not the federal 
government bound to aid us hi holding them in subjection ? I 
answer, not at all ; we are bound to protect the people of every 
State "against foreign invasion and internal violence." The 
class of persons who commit the violence, is a fact into which 
we cannot stop to inquire. If the violence rise from masters, 
we suppress it. If it rise from slaves, we do the same. If 
both masters and slaves are engaged, side by side, in an insur- 
rection, we shoot them down without knowing or inquiring 
which is master or which is slave. Our business is to suppress 
the violence, but we have no concern with slavery. 

I make this explanation, that I may be understood when I 



ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 113 

make the declaration that, under our Constitution, the federal 
government cannot interfere with slavery in the States for any 
purpose, either to sustain or to abolish it. This was the doc- 
trine avowed and understood by the framers of the Constitu- 
tion. It has been the avowed doctrine of southern men, and of 
northern men, from the adoption of the Constitution to this 
day. It is true that the federal government has often inter- 
posed its power in aid of slavery, by the common consent of all 
the States, when no objections were made by any person ; but, 
up to the present session of Congress, no man of any party, or 
from any portion of the Union, ever dared to stand forth before 
the nation and avow the doctrine, that this government possessed 
the constitutional power or right to exert the influence of the 
nation, to degrade its character, and exhaust its revenues, in 
support of slavery, or of the slave-trade. On various occasions 
I have myself, in this hall, called on gentlemen to avow such 
sentiments if they entertained them. But never, until since the 
commencement of the present session, was any member of this 
body found sufficiently callous to his own reputation to avow 
such principles. 

We have passed more than half a century under our present 
Constitution, and now the President assumes to himself the 
power of making slavery a national, instead of a State institu- 
tion, and of extending the power and influence of the federal 
government to its support. He has brought our army into the 
field in hostile attitude to a friendly power, with whom we are 
on terms of perfect amity, and has sent a fleet to insult and 
provoke that government to hostilities. He has by his secret 
orders, without the consent of the people of the nation or their, 
representatives, and without deigning even to consult his con- 
stitutional advisers, suddenly plunged us into a war, for the 
openly avowed object and purpose of extending and perpetu- 
ating slavery. These profligate acts, these usurpations of 
power, these violations of the Constitution, can, be character- 
ized by no term of milder signification than treason, — trea- 
son against the rights of the people of this nation, — treason 
against the Constitution, — and treason against humanity itself. 
10* 



114 ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 

I feel it my duty to declare it such in the presence of the 
House and of the country. 

Mr. Chairman, we at this moment appear before the civil- 
ized world in the disgraceful attitude of making war upon 
Mexico, an unoffending nation, in obvious violation of our 
treaty stipulations, and our national faith solemnly pledged, 
for the purpose of extending slavery, and perpetuating the 
sla*ve-trade. And I am exceedingly desirous of knowing 
whether any political party, or any respectable portion of any 
political party, intend to support and maintain this policy. 
What say our democratic friends ? Has the gentleman from 
Indiana (Mr. Owen) spoken the sentiments of his party ? Are 
the democrats of our free States prepared to follow his lead ? 
Will they enter the field with " democracy and slavery, Texas 
and the slave-trade," inscribed upon their banners ? If so, I 
ask them to come forth boldly, unfurl your banners, not to the 
breeze, but to the whirlwind of popular indignation, which must 
eventually scatter you to the four winds of heaven. 

Sir, the President, in seeking to sustain slavery in Texas, 
proposes to annex that government to this Union. Those who 
oppose this policy, deny the constitutional power to associate 
a foreign people with us in the administration of government. 
To this the gentleman from Alabama, (Mr. Belser,) replied 
rather sneeringly, as I thought, that there was a class of public 
men who deny the constitutional power of the federal govern- 
ment to annex Texas to this Union. He then went on to say 
that such were the views of the abolitionists, and that their 
candidate for President (James G. Birney) had started this 
doctrine. Now I beg leave to differ with that gentleman as to 
the authorship of this doctrine. It had been put forth long 
before Mr. Birney's letter was written. It was put forth by a 
greater abolitionist than Mr. Birney, — by a man whom I have 
always regarded as a far greater man, and to whose opinions I 
have, from my youth up, been taught to pay the highest re- 
spect. (Cries, " who is it, who is it ? ") He was the author of 
the first abolition tract ever published in the United States, 
and, in my opinion, the best ever put forth. (Cries, " name him, 



ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 115 

name him.") I borrowed my own abolition sentiments from his 
writings, and have cherished them, and should continue to do 
so, from respect to his memory, if from no other motive. His 
name was Thomas Jefferson. (A laugh.) And his abolition 
tract was called the "Declaration of Independence." (Great 
laughter.) 

Before I quote his sentiments, I will state that when he 
wrote, and subsequently to that period, so far as this question 
has been agitated, statesmen and jurists have drawn a marked 
distinction between the acquisition of mere territory, of acres 
or square miles of land uninhabited, and the annexing of a 
foreign people, who, having formed themselves into a govern- 
ment, attempt to unite with those of another nation. The 
ability to purchase territory without inhabitants, is one thing, 
but to annex a foreign government, — that is, the people of a 
foreign nation, with their habits, their moral and political 
views, — is another and a different subject. 

We must bear in mind that Mr. Jefferson was President, and 
that the territory of Louisiana had been purchased by a treaty 
negotiated under his administration, which, at the date of his 
letter to Mr. Breckenridge, awaited the sanction of Congress. 
The letter was dated on the 12th of August, 1803, and in it he 
says: 

" The treaty must of course be laid before the two houses of Congress, be- 
cause both have important functions to exercise respecting it. They, I pre- 
sume, will see their duty to their country, in ratifying and paying for it, so as to 
secure a good which would otherwise probably be never again in their power. 
But I suppose they must then appeal to the nation for an additional article to 
the Constitution, approving and confirming an act which the nation had not 
previously authorized." 

These were his words. He, Sir, had never conceived the 
idea that the Constitution had authorized the purchase of for- 
eign territory. He was conscious that the purchase was with- 
out any constitutional power, and suggested that an amendment 
to the Constitution should be proposed in order to sanction the 
act. But, lest his views might not be fully and explicitly un- 
derstood, he proceeds to say : " The Constitution has made no 



116 ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 

provision for our holding foreign territory, still less for incor- 
porating foreign nations into our Union." Here, Sir, is the 
doctrine, from the pen of a man whose opinions upon the Con- 
stitution I have always been accustomed to respect. Are we 
prepared to overthrow this doctrine, and to say that we have 
power to compel the people of New England to go into politi- 
cal association with Texan slave-holders ? 

I trust there will be but one voice from Ohio on these ques- 
tions now forced upon the country. I do not believe you can 
find an elector of that State, who is willing to degrade himself 
by associating with the slave-holders of Texas upon such terms 
of inequality as those to which I have alluded. 

Mr. Payne, of Alabama, interrupting Mr. Giddings, re- 
quested permission to propound a question. 

Mr. Giddings. An hour is a short time to make a speech ; 
but, if the gentleman will occupy but a moment, he may pro- 
pound his question. 

Mr. Payne desired the reporters to note what he said ; and 
stated that, about two years since, a man by the name of Tor- 
rey, a negro-stealer, brought a wagon and team to this district. 
While stealing some negroes, they were arrested, and Torrey 
made his escape. Subsequently, it was said that a member on 
this floor claimed the wagon and team, and he now asked the 
gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Giddings) what interest he had in 
the property ? 

Mr. Giddings. I am not at liberty to receive any thing 
uttered by a member on this floor as an insult. Indeed, 
nothing coming from a certain quarter can insult me. 

Mr. Payne. I call upon the gentleman from Ohio to 
answer my question ; and, if he does not, a committee ought 
to be appointed to inquire into the fact. (Cries of order, 
order.) 

Mr. Giddings. I have witnessed too many of these sud- 
den outbursts of passion to be very seriously alarmed by them. 

(Mr. Payne interrupting Mr. G.) A man that will deceive 
his own party cannot be ashamed of any thing (cries of order, 



ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 117 

order, from various parts of the hall ; the Chairman, rapping 
with his mallet, distinctly called Mr. Payne to order). After 
order was restored, Mr. Giddings resumed. 

Mr. Chairman, — These little innocent outpourings of the 
heart are perfectly harmless, even from an overseer, when 
deprived of his whip. You may, in such case, look him in the 
face with safety. To you, and to the members generally, 
whom I respect, I will say this is the first intimation that I 
have ever had, that any member was suspected of being con- 
nected with the transaction alluded to. Nor had I any inti- 
mation, relative to that affair, until I saw it in the newspapers. 
But I make this statement for the satisfaction of gentlemen, and 
not for that of the member from Alabama. I do not wish this 
insinuation to rest a moment uncontradicted in the minds of 
those who understand the common courtesies of life, who 
know what good breeding is ; while I would scorn the idea of 
making any reply whatever to the grovelling malice that 
prompts this attack. 

But to return from this episode. The legislature of Ohio 
has, by joint resolution, denied this right now advocated by the 
President ; other legislatures have united in sustaining this 
doctrine of Mr. Jefferson. These legislatures sustain the view 
of my venerable friend from Massachusetts, (Mr. Adams,) who 
opposed the passage of any law to control or govern the peo- 
ple of Louisiana, until the Constitution could be so amended as 
to authorize the annexation of the people of that government 
to our territory. 

But the people of Louisiana and of the United States appear 
to have unanimously desired the annexation, and it was done 
by common consent. Texas may now be annexed in the same 
manner. If the whole people of both governments desire, no 
other people nor government can object. 

The old articles of confederation made express provision for 
the annexation of Canada, whenever the people of that Prov- 
ince should desire it ; but this provision was left out of the 
Constitution, showing that the framers of that instrument 
intended to give no such authority to Congress. By adopting 



118 ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 

our Federal Constitution, a union was voluntarily formed of 
the old thirteen States. This was the act of each State ; for 
each determined for itself upon the propriety of adopting the 
Constitution. The compact made provisions for admitting by 
act of Congress new States, to be formed out of the territory 
included within the boundaries dividing our government from 
foreign nations. That union, formed by the wisdom of our 
fathers, and consecrated by the blood and suffering which had 
marked their recent struggle for independence, we love and 
cherish. To it we shall adhere in all its stipulations. We 
regard it as the sanctuary of American liberty. We shall 
defend it with our treasure and our lives. 

But, for one, I entertain no desire to surrender this Union 
for a new one with slave-holding Texas. Nor have I any 
desire to enter into a union with Texas, until it can be done 
upon terms of equality which shall be honorable to our people. 
Let her emancipate her slaves. Let her avow the doctrines 
of freedom, the doctrines of Jefferson, of Hancock, and their 
associates, the doctrines on which our government was based, 
and I will then be prepared to give a favorable consideration 
to this question. 

A slave-holding government is the most tyrannical that 
exists. The Emperor of Russia has not the same power over 
his serfs which the slave-holder of South Carolina possesses 
over his slaves. Russia has but one tyrant ; the United 
States contain at least an hundred and fifty thousand, each of 
whom possesses at this time more absolute power over the 
lives and liberties of those subject to his rule than does the 
Emperor of Russia. 

We are now called on to increase the number of these des- 
pots ; to extend the most flagrant despotism known to civilized 
man ; to give it power over ourselves and our descendants in 
coming time. I repudiate the proposition ; I will oppose it 
here and elsewhere ; I denounce it as dangerous to the liberties 
of the people, as establishing a precedent fraught with evil to 
the country. 



ANNEXATION OF TEXAS.* 



ITS EFFECT IN RENDERING THE OTHER STATES LIABLE TO PAY HER DEBTS — 
TO PERFORM HER TREATIES — OBJECTS OF ANNEXATION — EFFECT UPON 
SLAVERY — TO INCREASE THE EXPENSE OF OUR ARMY — OUR NAVY — OUR 
POST-OFFICE SYSTEM — OUR LAND SYSTEM — TO CORRUPT OUR MORALITY. 

[Our Secretary of State, (Mr. Calhoun,) in his instructions to our ministers at 
London and at Paiis, argued that slavery was a humane institution, equally ben- 
eficial to the master and slave, and of pure moral tendency. Copies of these let- 
ters of instruction were before the House, when the resolutions for annexing 
Texas came up for consideration, and Mr. Giddings replied to them in the fol- 
lowing speech.] 

Mr. Chairman, — In whatever light the subject before us 
be viewed, it becomes a question of " union between the gov- 
ernments of Texas and the United States." These govern- 
ments are, at this time, independent powers, — each acting 
under a written constitution, each passing laws for the govern- 
ment of its own people ; entering into treaties with foreign 
powers ; maintaining peace, or making war ; and discharging 
all the functions of an independent, sovereign nation. The 
people of each have selected that form of government which 
best accords with their own views ; and it is a reflection upon 
the people of Texas to talk of extending to them the benefits 
of a free government. The declaration carries with it an 
imputation that their present government is oppressive. 

It is proposed, by the resolutions before us, to unite these 
two nations into one consolidated government, so that the 



* Speech upon resolutions annexing Texas. Delivered in Committee of the 
whole House on the state of the Union, January 22, 1845. 



120 ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 

inhabitants of the two nations shall become one people, enjoy- 
ing the same national advantages, liable to the same national 
burdens, and be governed by the same general laws. We 
shall of course carry with us all the advantages arising from 
our present power and influence, and those which will result 
from our treaties with other nations. We shall carry with us 
into the new political copartnership, our public lands, and our 
revenues derived from every source ; at the same time, we 
shall carry with us our public debt, and our liabilities to foreign 
nations, arising from treaty stipulations. By entering into the 
proposed union, our debt will become the debt of the consoli- 
dated government ; our treaties, too, will then be the treaties 
of the new political union, and must be performed by it. Pre- 
cisely so with Texas. She, too, will bring with her the debts 
she owes. Her entering into the new union will not affect the 
rights of her creditors in foreign nations. By uniting with her, 
we shall become liable with her people for the payment of her 
debts. It is true that the resolutions before us provide that 
the new government shall pay only ten millions towards the 
debts of Texas. That is the contract between her government 
and ours ; and I need not say to gentlemen on this floor, that 
no compact between Texas and the United States can change 
or alter the rights of Great Britain, which that government 
holds under her treaties or compacts with Texas. These com- 
pacts and treaties have been solemnly entered into by Texas 
while a sovereign nation ; and, from the obligations which she 
has thus assumed, she cannot release herself by any act of hers, 
or by the joint act of herself and this nation. She is now 
bound for the payment of her whole debt due to foreign 
nations. The whole property of the nation is bound for the 
discharge of her debts, and must remain so until relieved by its 
payment. And, whether she comes into the Union as mere 
territory, or as a State, we shall be holden ; the whole consoli- 
dated government will be holden for its final payment. 

The reasons are perfectly obvious. When she enters into 
this new union, either as a State or territory, she comes under 
the protection -of the federal government ; and we must 



ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 121 

defend her people and their property. Her creditors can no 
longer make reprisals in case she neglects or refuses to pay her 
debts. If she fails to pay her debts, the new government, in 
its consolidated form, must either defend her in the disgrace of 
repudiation, or pay her debts. Now, the Committee on For- 
eign Affairs has estimated her debts at ten millions of dollars. 
They are also estimated by a distinguished statesman in the 
other end of the Capitol, at twenty-five millions, while others 
have estimated the amount at fifty millions. It is, however, 
certain that no person knows the amount of debts which Texas 
owes. Her own government is ignorant on that point, and has 
lately adopted measures to ascertain its amount. 

I wish most respectfully to propound an interrogatory to the 
chairman of the Committee on Foreign Affairs. Supposing the 
debt of Texas to amount to fifty millions of dollars, what do the 
advocates of annexation intend to do with the balance of forty 
millions which will remain, after paying the sum proposed by 
the resolutions before us ? As the chairman of the Committee 
on Foreign Affairs is not in his seat, I will respectfully ask any 
friend of annexation to answer the question. 

Mr. Rhett, of South Carolina, said that he proposed to have 
nothing to do with it. 

Mr. Giddings resumed. I had supposed such to be the 
intention ; but who does not see that a refusal on our part to 
pay the debts, would involve us in all the disgrace of her repu- 
diation ? We should then stand between Texas and her cred- 
itors ; we should not permit them to coerce the payment, nor 
would we pay the debt ourselves. The attitude which we 
should occupy, would surely be any thing but satisfactory. 
Now, Sir, we should be candid with ourselves and with the 
people ; and we ought to say frankly, at the outset, that we 
intend to share with Texas the payment of her debts, or that 
we will share with her the disgrace of repudiation. 

Again, Sir, we are told, that on the first of November, 1840, 
Texas entered into a treaty of commerce with Great Britain, 
by which she agreed to admit the manufactures of Great Brit- 
ain into her ports at the same rate of duties which Great Brit- 

11 



122 ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 

ain demands upon the cotton and sugar of Texas. The precise 
terms of this treaty are unknown to us. Mr. Urquhart, an 
English writer, says that the British minister informed the pub- 
lic that a treaty of commerce had been entered into upon terms 
of reciprocity, but that no copy of the treaty had been published 
or could be produced from the royal stationer at London. The 
duty, therefore, upon British manufactures, when introduced 
into Texas, will be comparatively nominal. This is the solemn 
stipulation of Texas, for which she has received a full consider- 
ation, and which she is solemnly bound to fulfil. We have no 
right to step between her and Great Britain, to relieve her 
from the performance of her contract. Now, when, Texas 
comes into the Union, I would ask any friend of annexation 
whether this solemn treaty is to be fulfilled, or is the pledged 
faith of Texas to be violated ? If any friend of the measure 
will be kind enough to inform me on this point, and to let the 
country know their intention, I will now yield him the floor for 
that purpose. If gentlemen will examine this point, they will 
find that we must continue, after the annexation, to receive 
British manufactures into Texas according to this treaty, or we 
must unite with Texas in repudiating her most solemn obliga- 
tions, and must share with her the disgrace consequent upon 
such an act of perfidy. But, Sir, our Constitution provides 
that " duties on imports shall be uniform in all the States." 
We shall, therefore, be under the necessity of bringing down 
our tariff to comport with that treaty, or we must violate the 
treaty or disregard the Constitution. Which horn of this 
dilemma will gentlemen prefer ? These are some of the diffi- 
culties which meet us at the threshold of this measure. Many 
others of equal magnitude exist, and have been urged by gen- 
tlemen who have preceded me in this debate. 

While addressing the committee on this subject at the last 
session of Congress, I spoke particularly of the great injustice 
consequent upon extending the slave representation. I would 
again call the attention of the committee to its present bearings. 
New Hampshire has a free population of 284,573 ; South Caro- 
lina has a free population of 267,360, and has seven Represen- 



ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 123 

tatives in Congress; while New Hampshire is permitted to 
have but four. Thus South Carolina, as a compensation for 
holding slaves, is allowed three members of Congress. Ohio 
has a free population of more than 1,500,000, and sends twenty- 
one members to this House ; while Virginia, South Carolina, 
Alabama, and Louisiana, with less free population, sends to this 
body thirty-nine members. Thus the slaveholding interests of 
those States are represented on this floor by eighteen members , 
who sit here with the representatives of freemen, and vote for 
laws to govern the intelligent supporters of freedom in our 
northern States. And what is, if possible, more opposed to jus- 
tice, they are about to vote to bring in a still greater number of 
the representatives of slaves by annexing Texas. In this way 
our intelligent people of the North are degraded to the political 
level of southern slaves. There is no moral or political obli- 
gation that makes it our duty to place the slaves of Texas, or 
of any other foreign government, upon a level with the intelli- 
gent supporters of liberty in our northern States. If this plan 
be consummated, it will be by the aid of northern votes. Will 
any member vote for this insult to northern freemen, and then 
say that he has maintained northern rights or northern honor ? 

The President in his message says, that " the annexation of 
Texas to the United States, will give to Mexico no just cause 
of offence." We are all conscious that a state of war now 
exists between Texas and Mexico. By entering into the pro- 
posed union with Texas, we shall become obligated to defend 
her. And when the armies of Mexico invade Texas, we must 
of course send our army and navy to repel such invasion. This 
interference will constitute us the aggressors. We shall thus 
make the war of Texas our war ; and our sons will be liable to 
march to that country to fight the battles of Texas, to shed 
their blood, and leave their bones to whiten upon her plains, 
in order that slavery may continue, and the slave-trade 
flourish. 

The gentleman from Indiana (Mr. Brown) says that his con- 
stituents had rather fight than work. I represent no such con- 
stituency. The people of Ohio, in the late war, showed them- 



124 ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 

selves ready to do battle for the cause of freedom ; they fought 
valiantly for their liberty, their firesides, their wives and chil- 
dren ; but they are the last people in the world to fight for 
slavery. That, Sir, is an institution which they execrate, and 
which they would gladly strike from existence, if they pos- 
sessed the constitutional power to do so. For me to say that 
they were ready to fight for slavery, would be a libel upon 
their character. 

But this question of annexation is merely a collateral con- 
sideration. It is sought only as the means of attaining the 
ulterior objects of sustaining slavery in Texas, the slave-trade 
between our slave-holding States, and the people of that 
government; of perpetuating that institution in the southern 
States of this Union, and giving to those States a preponderance 
of political power. This fact was fully stated by me in my 
remarks made during the last Congress, and I now merely refer 
to the official evidence, which was not then before me. 

The official letter of Mr. Upshur, then Secretary of State, to 
our " Charge de Affairs " in Texas, commences by stating that 
" a communication had been received from a gentleman of 
Maryland," (supposed to be General Duff Green,) " informing 
the department that a plan was on foot among the abolitionists 
of Great Britain to procure the abolition of slavery in Texas," 
(not in the United States). This information gave rise to the 
whole effort on the part of our government to effect the union 
now sought. The same officer, in a subsequent letter addressed 
to our " Charge de Affairs in Texas," Mr. Murphy, declared 
his conviction, 

" That slavery would be abolished in Texas within the next ten years, and 
probably within half that time, unless that government were annexed to the 
United States." 

Other letters from gentlemen, said by the President to be 
men of high standing in Texas, (but whose names are withheld 
from us,) declare, 

" That unless Texas be annexed to the United States, she will not sustain the 
institution of slavery five years longer." 

The declaration of Lord Brougham, in the House of Lords, 



ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 125 

" That the abohtion of slavery in Texas would cut off the market for slaves 
now sent from the slave-breeding States of this Union to Texas, and thereby 
tend to the ultimate abolition of slavery -in those States," 

is referred to, and dwelt upon by the honorable Secretary, as n 
circumstance of an " alarming character." The continuance of 
this traffic is one of the objects maintained in the official cor- 
respondence to which I have referred. During the late politi- 
cal campaign in some of the slave-breeding States, these objects 
were eloquently urged in the speeches of stump orators, were 
maintained by the principal slave-merchants of this city, one of 
whom kept the banner of the " Lone Star," floating for months 
over the prison of his sighing and weeping stock of human 
merchandise. The same object of maintaining this slave-trade 
was avowed in the other end of this capitol by a distinguished 
Senator, (Mr. McDuffie,) who, after stating the increase of 
slaves in the southern States, remarked : 

" Now if we shall annex Texas, it will operate as a safety-valve to let off 
this superabundant slave population from among us." 

And the same doctrine was advanced on this floor, by gentle- 
men from the slave States, who boldly avowed, that 

" Slavery must be maintained in Texas, or it must cease to exist in the 
United States." 

But, Sir, these declarations and evidences of the motives 
and objects of annexation have become so overwhelming, that 
even a reference to them would appear to be a waste of time 
and of words. Before I proceed farther, I must notice one 
point in the argument of the gentleman from South Carolina, 
(Mr. Rhett). He charged the representatives of the North 
with agitating the question of slavery on this floor, until we 
had driven the South into this plan of annexation, as a mea- 
sure of "self-defence." And is it so? Is this assertion true? 
Is it founded on fact, or does it rest in empty declamation ? 
Sir, who brought on the present discussion, in which slavery, 
in all its bearings, is the distinct issue ? It was a slave-holding 
President ; a slave-holding cabinet. It is now urged by slave- 
holders, as a " slave question." 
11* 



126 ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 

But, Sir, I must turn my attention to the official correspon- 
dence before us, and the remarks which I intend to make will 
be directed to three of the prominent features of Mr. Calhoun's 
letters to Mr. Packenham and to Mr. King. Those three 
points are, — 

First. The economical bearings of slavery upon our nation. 

Secondly. The moral bearings of that institution upon the 
people of the slave-holding States, both slaves and freemen. 

Tiddly. The constitutional powers of the federal govern- 
ment over slavery. 

Before I enter upon the examination of these points, how- 
ever, I will detain the committee for a moment, by calling their 
attention to the peculiar attitude in which we, as a nation, are 
now placed before the civilized world. England has abolished 
slavery in her dominions. France is already moving upon that 
subject, and Denmark has taken the incipient steps for setting 
her slaves free. So palpable are the turpitude and disgrace of 
holding slaves, that even semi-barbarous nations are, at this 
day, lustrating themselves from its moral contagion. The Bey 
of Tripoli, in his decree prohibiting the slave-trade, which our 
honorable Secretary of State is so anxious to maintain, de- 
clared that he did it "for the honor of man and the glory of 
God." But while the Bey of Tripoli and the Pacha of Egypt 
are extending the enjoyment of civil liberty, this government 
is openly engaged in endeavoring to extend the institution of 
slavery. While we ourselves are sending one fleet to suppress 
the slave-trade on the African coast, we are sending another to 
support the same traffic upon the American coast. 

While we have entered into solemn treaty with England to 
exert our utmost effort to suppress this trade in human flesh, 
our Secretary of State is calling upon the King of France to 
assist us, in extending and maintaining it. While we, as a 
nation, are professing to be lovers of liberty, our high officers of 
government are exerting our national influence to increase and 
extend slavery. 

Our representatives in 1776 declared the right of man to 
the enjoyment of his liberty to be self-evident, while our Exe- 



ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 127 

cutive, in 1844, declares the progress of human liberty in a 
neighboring government to be highly dangerous to our pros- 
perity. Of all the civilized nations of the earth, ours alone 
now stands as the advocate of negro slavery. The spectacle is 
humiliating ; but so it is, that the Executive of this nation is 
now remonstrating with European potentates against their efforts 
to promote human liberty, and using all the skill and intrigue 
of diplomacy to prevent the extension of human freedom. 

I will further remark, that what I have to say upon the 
economical bearings of slavery will be strictly in answer to the 
arguments of our honorable Secretary of State, contained in 
his letters to the British minister, (Mr. Packenham,) and to 
our minister at Paris, (Mr. King). 

He urges upon Mr. King and the French government, that 
the abolition of slavery " has diminished the exports of the 
British West India Islands ; " and he infers, that it would have 
the same effect in this country, if our slave States were to fol- 
low their example in respect to emancipation. Now, Sir, the 
argument is not legitimate. It places pecuniary profit in the 
scale against the natural rights of man, and gives preponder- 
ance to the former. Go to the thief, who lives and thrives by 
his midnight larcenies ; remonstrate with him ; tell him that 
the property of his neighbors of right belongs to them, and 
that he ought not feloniously to take it, — he may turn round, 
and, in the language of our honorable Secretary, say to you, 
that were he to adopt your ideas of justice, and cease his 
thefts, " his exports would be diminished." Go to the pirate, 
who robs the merchant vessel of its rich lading, and, in order 
to destroy all evidence of his crimes, murders the crew, and 
sinks the ship. Tell him that his practice is criminal, and 
that he ought to cease from farther outrages ; and he will reply, 
in the language of American diplomacy, that his "exports 
would be diminished." Still, we should regard him as a pirate, 
and hope that justice would overtake him. His excuse would 
not mitigate his crimes ; nay, it would aggravate his guilt. So 
with our Secretary's argument. If slavery be opposed to the 
natural rights of men ; if it be a self-evident truth, that " man 



128 ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 

is born free," and has received from his God the right to 
enjoy his liberty, then it is a wrong ; it is a crime for us to rob 
him of his God-given rights, although it may thereby " increase 
our exports." 

The honorable Secretary argues, that emancipation dimin- 
ishes the wealth of a nation, from the fact that the exports of 
the British West India Islands were diminished after the tak- 
ing effect of her act of emancipation. He does not notice the 
fact, however, that while slavery existed there, the whole slave 
population — men, women, and children — were employed in 
the production of exports. After emancipation the females 
were withdrawn from field labor, and employed in prepar- 
ing comfortable food and clothing for their families ; the children 
were taken from the fields, and sent to school ; the males, also, 
appropriated a part of their time in preparing comfortable 
dwellings for their families, and in cultivating vegetables for 
family use. Thus more than one half of the time previously 
employed in the production of exports, was diverted to other 
purposes more important ; and while the exports were un- 
doubtedly reduced, the people were rapidly improving their 
physical and intellectual condition. And their intellectual 
wealth, their happiness, the amount of human enjoyment was 
increased a thousand fold. Should our States emancipate their 
slaves, they would undoubtedly export less cotton and sugar for 
some years afterwards. Their colored population would find 
new wants in their new condition, which must be supplied. 
They must have comfortable diet and clothing ; they would 
wear hats, and shoes, and bonnets, and decent attire. These 
demands would open up a new and extensive market for manu- 
facturers ; and, as they would find themselves able, they would 
begin to purchase small lots of ground, which would increase 
the price of real estate ; and in five or ten years, the lands in 
those States would be worth more than both lands and slaves 
are at this time. These deductions are warranted from the 
well established facts that have resulted from emancipation in 
the West India Islands. 

But I desire for a moment to call the attention of the com- 



ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 129 

mittee to the effects which slavery has upon the physical 
ability of a nation to defend itself in time of war. Slavery is 
an element of national weakness ; it is a state of unceasing 
war between the master and slave. The slaves have been 
reduced to their present condition by physical force ; and the 
master holds them in subjection merely by superior power, — 
by violence, outrage, and crime. The laws which authorize 
the master to exercise control over his slaves, were passed 
without the actual or implied consent of the slaves. To such 
laws, they have at no time yielded other than compulsory 
obedience, they are under no moral obligation to obey such 
laws ; they owe no allegiance whatever to our government. 
They may at the first possible moment rise, and with physical 
force make slaves of their present masters, without any greater 
violation of moral principle than is daily practised by their 
owners in holding them in bondage. They sigh for liberty ; 
they feel deeply the wrongs to which they are subjected, and 
will have no hesitation in regaining their freedom at any 
sacrifice to their oppressors, either of property or of life. The 
slave will feel himself at perfect liberty to use any, and all 
means in his power to throw off his chains, whenever a reason- 
able opportunity is presented. . If a hostile army should 
encamp in his neighborhood, he will join them, though he be 
under the necessity of taking the lives of his master and 
family in order to effect it. These slaves would be infinitely 
less dangerous if they were removed beyond our boundaries. 
We could, in such case, protect ourselves against them with an 
army of one tenth of their numbers. 

But the danger to us in case of war arises from the fact, 
that they are scattered through all our slave States, located on 
every plantation, and in almost every house. They are ac- 
quainted with the habits of their masters ; with the roads and 
streams, the arsenals and fortifications ; in short, with all the 
circumstances with which they are surrounded. Now, Sir, let 
an invading army of a hundred thousand men land in our 
southern States with the materiel for two hundred thousand, 
and let them proclaim freedom to such slaves as will unite with 



130 ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 

them ; and as the slaves reach their encampment, let them be 
armed, and drilled, and sent out to liberate their wives and 
children, and those who have been oppressed with them. 
Could more efficient troops be employed ? Stimulated by a 
recollection of the wrongs which they had suffered, they would 
become desperate, and the consequences I will not attempt to 
describe. Sir, in case of invasion the master will not dare to 
send his servant abroad, or to the field, unless he is watched ; 
if he does, the servant will not be likely to return. At night, 
too, they must be watched, and the family must be guarded 
against their domestics. Thus they detract from the ability of 
a nation to defend it. In 1779, the authorities of South Caro- 
lina sent a special messenger to Congress, to inform that body 
that their State could furnish no troops to repel the invasion 
then making upon them, as it required all their forces to 
remain at home, in order to protect their families against their 
slaves ! The free population of that State was then nearly a 
hundred thousand greater than that of her slaves. It should 
also be remembered, that the British army during that war 
dared not proclaim freedom to slaves, or employ them as troops, 
from apprehension as to the effect of such a measure upon the 
slaves in their West India Islands. If, under such circum- 
stances, it required three hundred thousand free people to 
guard two hundred thousand slaves, what number would have 
been required if the enemy had proclaimed freedom to the 
slaves, and employed them as troops against their former 
owners ? We have in the United States fifteen millions of 
free population, and two and a half millions of slaves ; but 
with this population we are less, far less capable of resisting 
an invading army, than we should be with a population of ten 
millions, composed entirely of freemen. Indeed, we are far 
less able to resist an invading foe with our present Union, than 
the free States would be if they composed a separate govern- 
ment, without any association with the slave States. In other 
words, in case of serious invasion, South Carolina, Louisiana, 
and Mississippi and Alabama would be unable to watch their 
own slaves, and would require all the force which the northern 



ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 131 

slave States could spare to assist them in that duty, while the 
defence of the whole nation would substantially fall upon the 
free States. 

I desire that southern gentlemen will understand me, as 
making these remarks- strictly in answer to the doctrine 
advanced by Mr. Calhoun and others, and not with any desire 
to call up unpleasant feelings in the mind of any southern man. 
General Jackson, and others, say that it is necessary that we 
should have Texas as a means of national defence. I reply, that 
every addition of slave territory renders us weaker, and places a 
heavier burden upon the free States. This extending slavery 
at the expense of our free States, is what the honorable Secre- 
tary regards as economy. If southern gentlemen regard it in 
that light, I may be permitted to assure them, that we of the 
North look upon its economical bearings as altogether unfavor- 
able to our interests. We are bound by the Constitution to 
defend the southern States in case of invasion, or of domestic 
violence. That stipulation we will perform to the letter ; but 
there we stop — we go no further. We will not take upon 
ourselves any obligation to protect the slave-holders of Texas. 
If that government will abolish slavery, those who are now 
slaves will gladly constitute an army that will protect the whole 
people of that government. Let them adopt that mode ; but 
let not the freemen of New England, or of the free States, be 
subjected to the degradation of defending the slave-holders of 
Texas. 

The protection of southern slaves has constantly entered into 
the considerations which have heretofore prompted the increase 
of our navy. The report of the Secretary of the Navy at the 
2d Session of the 27th Congress, recommended an increase of 
our naval armament to one half the force of the British navy ; 
and the principal reason which he urged for such a vast 
expenditure, was the support of slavery. One of the employ- 
ments of the " home squadron " has been the protection of the 
coastwise slave-trade ; and little doubt now exists that it origi- 
nated in a desire to uphold that commerce. And this is the 
" economy " so desired by our Secretary of State. The annex- 



132 ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 

ation of Texas would call for an increase of our naval arma- 
ment, in order that slavery might be protected there, as well 
as in the present slave States. This will be one of the conse- 
quences of annexation. 

This proposed union with Texas will require a large increase 
of our army. Our present army has often been dispersed in 
different parts of our slave States, in order to intimidate south- 
ern slaves to obedience. For that purpose a regiment has 
been sent to one place, and a company to another, to stand 
guard, while southern overseers and slave-holders could scourge 
their fellow men into subjection. This is another of the " eco- 
nomical" bearings of slavery. Methinks that southern men 
should be content with this use of our present army, instead of 
endeavoring to make them mount guard to protect the Texan 
slave-holders from the just vengeance of an enslaved people. 

If Texas be brought into the Union, we shall be called on to 
extend around her a circle of fortifications for the purpose of 
protecting her from invasion. An expenditure, annually, of 
many millions of dollars, will be required for that purpose. 
That labor must be performed by slaves, as all such labor is 
now performed in our slave States ; for free labor is not per- 
mitted in slave States to come into competition with slave labor. 
For this slave labor we pay about the same price per day, as I 
am informed, that is paid to the laboring free men of the North, 
while I believe it is universally admitted that one freeman will, 
upon an average, perform as much labor in a given time as two 
slaves. In this way, the erection of fortifications in our slave 
States is rendered important to the support of slavery ; as all 
must see, that while we pay one dollar for the actual erection 
of forts, we pay another to support slavery. It will, therefore, 
answer for slave-holders to regard slavery as an economical 
institution, inasmuch as it enables them to draw money from 
the pockets of northern men to enrich themselves. Why, Sir, 
I have known members of this House sitting here and advocat- 
ing heavy appropriations for southern fortifications, while they 
were receiving of the moneys thus appropriated thirty dollars 
per day for the labor of their slaves, who were kept in the con- 



ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 133 

stant employ of government. To such gentlemen, I have no 
doubt, the institution appeared to be profitable, however it may- 
appear to northern men who pay the money. Now, Sir, I 
object to extending this kind of economy into Texas at the 
expense of the northern States. 

Again, Sir, let us look into the Post-Office Department, and 
see the effects of slavery upon that branch of our national 
expenditure. Slaves neither take newspapers, nor write let- 
ters, nor pay postage. They prevent the accumulation of a 
dense population ; of course the roads are indifferent, and the 
transportation of the mail in our slave States is expensive. 
An average of several years past will show, that we have paid 
for transporting the mail in the slave States, annually, half a 
million dollars more than we have received from those States 
by way of postage ; while the free States have paid about the 
same amount in postage more than has been expended in trans- 
porting the mail therein. Thus we all see from the official 
documents before us, that the people of the free States have 
been for years taxed, at least half a million of dollars annually, 
to transport the mail in the slave States. This is another 
illustration of the pecuniary bearings of slavery. And, for one, 
I object to extending the transportation of the mail into Texas, 
at the annual expense to the free States of some three hundred 
thousand dollars. I do not believe its economical bearings 
favorable to our interests. 

Let us for a moment examine the expenditures and receipts 
arising from our public lands. From the documents on file in 
the General Land Office, it appears that the public lands in 
our slave States have cost us forty millions dollars more than 
we have received in return upon the sales of those lands ; 
while we have realized a profit upon the sale of our public 
lands in the free States, to the amount of thirty-eight millions 
dollars. All will see that the whole amount of this thirty-eight 
millions has been drawn from the people of the free States, and 
expended in the slave States, in consequence of the pecuniary 
bearings of slavery. And this is the economy of slavery so 
vauntingly put forth by our Secretary of State. Sir, from the 
12 



134 ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 

public lands of Texas may we be delivered ! If the proposed 
union should be formed, I would at once vote for an appropri- 
ation of five or ten millions of dollars to be saved from all fur- 
ther expense arising from them. By the time this government 
shall have settled the extent of the French grants, the Spanish 
grants, the Mexican grants, and the Texan grants, paid up the 
deficiencies in those grants, extinguished the Indian titles, sur- 
veyed the lands, and defrayed the expenses of the sales, we 
may expect a net loss of at least twenty millions to the public 
treasury. Yet we hear it urged that their lands will yield a 
net surplus sufficient to pay the debts of Texas. I ask, on 
what data are such arguments based ? 

The pecuniary bearings of slavery were well illustrated in 
the Florida war, which was commenced and prosecuted in 
order to recapture the fugitive slaves who had sought an asy- 
lum in that territory. It was carried on for seven years, at an 
-expenditure of forty millions dollars, and some hundreds of 
lives, in order to capture and return to their owners some five 
hundred slaves ; making each slave cost the nation about eighty 
thousand dollars, mostly taken from the pockets of northern 
freemen. This is the economy of slavery. Sir, I object to 
placing ourselves in a situation to be called upon to catch the 
runaway slaves of Texas. If this be economy, may Heaven 
save us from its extension. 

But argument on this point would be useless to gentlemen 
who have travelled in the free and in the slave States. Let 
us look to the largest States at the time of forming our Consti- 
tution-; I refer to Virginia and New York. Let us examine 
the latter ; take notice of her turnpikes, her railroads, her 
canals, her industrious and thriving population, her commerce 
and universal prosperity. Then look at Virginia ! Mark her 
miserable highways, her deserted plantations, her dilapidated 
dwellings, her ragged slaves of almost every shade of complex- 
ion, her uncouth implements of husbandry, the indolence and 
extravagance of her people, her extensive forests, the almost 
total absence of all evidence of thrift and prosperity ; and we 
shall not be under the necessity of reading the correspondence 



ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 135 

alluded to, in order to form an opinion of the pecuniary effects 
of slavery. At the adoption of our Federal Constitution, in 
1790, Virginia contained a free population nearly a hundred 
thousand greater than New York. In 1840, the free popula- 
tion of New York was nearly four times as great as that of 
Virginia. Within that period, the slaves of New York have 
been converted into industrious, enterprising, and intelligent 
citizens ; while those of Virginia remain in their chains, igno- 
rant and degraded, the subjects of merchandise. Ten thousand 
five hundred and ninety-three primary schools were in progress 
in New York at the taking of the census of 1840 ; while Vir- 
ginia could boast of but one thousand five hundred and sixty- 
one. At those schools in New York, five hundred and two 
thousand three hundred and sixty-seven scholars were in- 
structed, while Virginia furnished to her primary schools only 
thirty-five thousand three hundred and sixty-one. Among the 
free white population of Virginia over twenty years of age, one 
in every twelve is unable to read or write ; while only one in 
fifty-three of the same description of population in New York 
is thus deficient in education. But, in order to form a just esti- 
mate of the comparative intelligence of the two States, we 
should bear in mind that more than one third of the population 
of Virginia are slaves, kept in the most profound ignorance ; 
so that about five twelfths of her whole population, over twenty 
years of age, can neither read nor write. Such is the moral 
degradation of " the Old Dominion ; " once the home of Wash- 
ington, of Jefferson, of Madison, and of Monroe ; the mother 
of States and of statesmen. But now " there is none so poor 
as to do her reverence." It is slavery that sits like an incubus 
upon her, prostrating her energies, corroding her morals, and 
degrading her people. In the language of one of her most 
talented sons, " she has become a vast menagerie, where meni 
are bred for the market like oxen for the shambles." 

But what I have said of Virginia is by way of illustration. 
The same remarks will apply substantially to all of the slave 
States ; for it is to slavery alone that Virginia may impute her 
want of prosperity. And, if ignorance in the great mass of 



136 ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 

people be economy, then, surely, may our honorable Secretary 
of State boast of slavery as an economical institution. It was 
well remarked by the gentleman from Illinois, (Mr. Hardin,) 
that slavery begets a contempt for labor. Such is undoubtedly 
the case. It is said of John Randolph, that when he desired 
to express his utmost contempt for a man, he would assert that 
" he hoes corn with negroes." In our free States we have no 
idle persons. Our wives, our daughters, and our sons, are 
bred to industry ; but, in the slave States, the great mass of 
free people not only refuse to labor, but many of them live in 
habits of great extravagance, while the non-slaveholding class 
of free people are generally indolent, and miserably poor. Of 
the aggregate amount of time usually appropriated to labor by 
the people of the free States, at least one half is spent in idle- 
ness by the people of the slave States. It is, therefore, quite 
plain that vice, ignorance, and poverty must result from the 
existence of slavery. Yet the honorable Secretary of State 
regards it as attended with great pecuniary blessings to our 
nation. 

But I desire to look into the moral influences of slavery, 
which our honorable Secretary regards as so salutary. I am 
aware that the honorable gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. 
Winthrop) intimated the danger of driving southern whigs 
from us, if we speak against slavery. I do not entertain such 
fears. The Secretary of State has sent to this House an elab- 
orate argument in favor of the moral influences of slavery. 
This argument has been published to the world, and is now 
before us. If we do not reply to it, we shall be regarded as 
having given our tacit assent to its truth. If Southern whigs 
desire us to keep silence under these circumstances, I cannot 
yield to their wishes. Nay, if they would do that, they are no 
whigs. It is, therefore, my intention to speak with the most 
perfect frankness. I have never before felt disposed to enter 
upon the discussion of the morality of slavery, while sitting in 
this hall, for the reason that it was never before forced upon 
us. But we now have the argument of the honorable Secre- 
tary thrust upon us, as well as the arguments of gentlemen in 



ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 137 

this hall, who have eloquently insisted upon the humane and 
moral character of slavery. Under these circumstances, we 
must meet the arguments, or timidly shrink from the contest. 

Sir, I deny that slavery is characterized by either humanity 
or morality. To take from a man his liberty, is the highest 
injury you can inflict upon him, except to deprive him of life. 
Indeed, by taking from him his liberty, you deprive him of the 
power to protect his life ; and it is not unfrequently the case, 
that the life of the slave is sacrificed by withholding from him 
his liberty. But I shall again refer to this point ; at present I 
will call the attention of the committee to some illustrations of 
the morality of slave-holding, which meets us on every street 
of this city. I refer to the infinite shades of complexion that 
mark the slave population around us ; varying from a perfect 
black to the lightest complexion of the Anglo-Saxon race ; 
indeed, it is not unusual to meet a slave with a lighter complex- 
ion than his master. But a few days since, an advertisement 
appeared in the principal papers of this city, offering a reward 
of jive hundred dollars for the arrest of a fugitive slave, de- 
scribed as a young woman sixteen or seventeen years of age, 
"white, with straight dark hair, intelligent countenance, and 
agreeable manners." The extraordinary bounty offered for 
her arrest, was doubtless in consequence of her complexion 
and manners. Sir, I have no doubt that our people of the free 
States will marvel at seeing advertisements for white slaves-. 
But Mr. Jefferson informs us that " some of the best blood of 
Virginia runs in the veins of her slaves." Perhaps the fair 
fugitive to whom I have made allusion, descended from some 
aristocratic family of " the Old Dominion." I am told that it 
is not unusual for a man to hold his own children in slavery, 
and even to sell them to those who deal in human flesh. It is- 
said, also, to be a very common thing for a planter to hold in 
slavery the children of his father, and even to sell them as- 
merchandise. These are mild illustrations of the moral bear- 
ings of slavery, which our Secretary of State regards as 
humane and salutary. 

Go to that bastile of slavery on Maryland Avenue, which is 
12* 



138 ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 

so distinctly in view from the windows of this hall ; mark' its 
dark, its hated walls ; enter its heavy gates ; look into its cells ; 
notice the countenances of its inmates ; witness the grief, the 
deep-seated horror and despair manifest in every face ; see the 
heaving bosoms, and the silent tears ; listen to the suppressed 
sighs ; see them chained in coffles, and marched on board the 
slave-ship ; view their unutterable agony of soul as they take a 
last sad look towards the scenes of their childhood ; attend them 
on their voyage to the slave-market in the far South, to their 
new homes ; witness the deep degradation and suffering to 
which they are subjected, until death relieves them, and closes 
up the short drama ; then say, whether you are convinced of 
the benign influence and the moral purity of slavery. We are 
asked to extend and perpetuate these scenes. Will northern 
men do it ? We, as a nation, have declared our abhorrence of 
the slave-trade. We have declared it piracy by our laws, and 
we punish with death those who shall engage in it upon a for- 
eign coast ; while, by our legislative enactments, we continue 
and sustain it, with all its crimes and horrors, in our national 
metropolis ; and a high officer of this government seeks the aid 
and countenance of a European monarch, to enable us to main- 
tain it in Texas; For that purpose, he enters into a labored 
argument to show to the civilized world that it is both moral 
and benevolent. This essay in favor of slavery and the slave- 
trade, is urged upon members of this House. 

Why, Sir, I became acquainted with its salutary tendency 
soon after taking a seat in this hall, some eight years since. I 
have often related the transaction as it was communicated to 
me by different persons at the time. I believe their relation to 
be strictly correct ; but if any gentleman doubts its entire accu- 
racy, I should be pleased to have a committee, with power to 
send for persons and papers, and let the whole truth be called 
forth and published. 

A lady ! one of that sex in whom we look for all the finer 
sensibilities of our nature, residing in this city, on Pennsylva- 
nia Avenue, owned a slave, said to approximate more nearly to 
the white than to the colored race. He was intelligent and 



ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 139 

industrious. He had a wife and several children, to whom he 
was much attached. His owner informed him that she was 
about selling him to one of those piratical dealers in mankind, 
always to be found in this city, and at this time advocating the 
annexation of Texas, and the extension of the slave-trade. 
The man remonstrated with his owner ; tojd her that he could 
not survive a separation from his children, his wife, and his 
friends ; and when she showed no disposition to listen to his 
supplication, he took a knife from his pocket and attempted to 
cut his throat in her presence. He was seized by his fellow 
servants, and the knife taken from him, and a surgeon called, 
who dressed his wound. After this was done, finding himself 
relieved from the grasp of his fellow servants, he sprang from 
them, ran to the bridge across the canal, and threw himself into 
its turbid waters, preferring its muddy bottom for his grave, 
rather than submit to the torture, the pangs, and sufferings that 
awaited his' separation from his family. His body was taken 
from the canal the next morning by his fellow slaves, and lay 
exposed for some time on the bridge located on Seventh street. 
As a further illustration, I refer to a transaction less noto- 
rious. I am not prepared to vouch its entire accuracy, though 
I believe it to be literally true ; and if any gentleman doubts 
its correctness, I will unite with him in asking of the House a 
committee for the purpose of eliciting the whole truth. I 
believe my venerable friend before me, (Mr. Adams,) has once 
referred to the same transaction.* A slave mother, with her 



* Mr. Adams subsequently informed Mr. Giddings that the case to which he 
(Mr. Adams) had once made allusion, was the case of a woman who had lived 
in Washington city. She had been set free by her owner, who was a widow ; 
but no deed of emancipation was executed, although the woman regarded her- 
self free, and was so regarded by her former owner, and all others. She lived 
in this situation, and became the mother of a family of four children, when her 
owner died. The heirs of her owner then seized upon her and her children; 
took them to Alexandria, and sold them to a slave-dealer ; while imprisoned 
there, she murdered her two youngest children, and, while endeavoring to take 
the life of the next older, he and the other surviving child raised such a cry of 
distress as to attract the attention of those without, and they were saved by 
the timely aid of persons near the prison. The dealer in human flesh, who had 
purchased the woman and children, returned them to their venders, and sued 
them " for fraud, in selling a vicious slave." 



140 ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 

two children, was brought from the country to the city for the 
purpose of selling them to those who deal in mankind. They 
were imprisoned in that common receptacle of "human cattle " 
to which I have heretofore referred. While thus confined in the 
dreary dungeon, with none but the eye of her God and her 
children upon her, she reflected upon her lowly hovel, her 
home, her husband, her children, from whom she had been 
separated, upon her friends, and the scenes of her happier 
days. Then as she looked forward to the short life and the 
speedy death that awaited her, and viewed her two children, 
and the lives of bondage and degradation to which they were 
to be subjected, her mind was wrought up to desperation ; 
reason tottered, and reeling, fell from its throne ; she became a 
maniac, and seizing her children, tore from them the life which 
God had given, then severed the thread of her own existence, 
and rushed unbidden to the presence of her final Judge. This 
is but another illustration of the humane influence of slavery, 
so much extolled by our Secretary of State. 

My colleague from the Butler district (Mr. Weller) was 
anxious to extend our " democratic institutions " to Texas. It 
is this particular branch of our " democratic institutions " now 
sought to be extended and perpetuated. These scenes, to 
which I have referred, took place in this city, under our own 
laws, enacted by Congress, and which are now kept in force by 
the action of the very gentlemen who exhibit so much sympa- 
thy for the people of Texas, and who become so eloquent in 
favor " of extending the area of freedom," by establishing and 
perpetuating the slave-trade, with its horrors and crimes, its 
outrages and its murders. 

Gentlemen here become pathetic upon the sufferings to which 
the people of Texas have been subjected during their war with 
Mexico. They speak in melting terms of the predatory war- 
fare heretofore carried on against Texas, and they ask the j>eo- 
ple of our free States to relieve them from Mexican barbarity. 
Why, Sir, there is more human suffering in this city, every 
year, by reason of the slave-trade, than has been endured by 
the whole people of Texas during their entire revolution of 
eight years. The consumption of human life attendant, and 



ANNEXATION OF TEXlS. 141 

consequent upon, the slave-trade in this district, is greater 
every year than it has been in Texas during any period of 
their war with Mexico. It should be borne in mind that this 
slave-trade is authorized and maintained by act of Congress, 
which the advocates of- annexation refuse to repeal. The 
scenes which I have described, and the sufferings which I have 
mentioned, are authorized by our laws, passed by this body, and 
which we now keep in force. Gentlemen on this floor, who, 
by supporting the gag rule, have for years voted to continue 
those laws, and the scenes to which I have made reference ; 
whose hearts are unmoved by all the suffering of the slave 
population here, and by all the blood that is annually shed in 
this district, become eloquent upon the sufferings endured by 
the people of Texas. They are willing to spend the national 
treasure, and pour out American blood to protect the Texans, 
while they will authorize by law all those crimes and outrages, 
and all the violence and bloodshed attendant upon the. slave- 
trade in this district. Indeed, they are striving to extend and 
perpetuate those crimes in Texas, under the plea of " extend- 
ing the area of freedom." 

Our President, too, in his message, speaks of the " barbar- 
ous manner " in which the Mexicans have prosecuted the war 
against Texas, and appears anxious to relieve the people of 
that nation from the persecutions to which they are subjected ; 
while in this city, within view of his own window, the slave 
population are subjected to a thousand times greater suffering, 
by reason of our own laws. But for them he has no sympathy, 
no compassion ; nay, he lends his influence to extend and per- 
petuate in Texas those very crimes and outrages to which I 
have alluded. 

The instances to which I have called the attention of the 
committee, are merely examples of what is daily taking place 
in the slave States. The amount of human suffering, and the 
consumption of human life within those States is incalculable. 
Upon the cotton plantations they purchase none but full grown 
slaves. The average of the slaves thus purchased, after enter- 
ing upon the plantations, is only seven years. I speak upon 



142 ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 

the authority of extensive cotton growers, whose long experi- 
ence and observation enables them to form correct opinions. 
It is regarded by cotton growers as more profitable to drive 
their slaves so hard that the intensity of their labor shall pro- 
duce death in seven years, and then to supply their places by 
fresh purchases, than it is to treat them more leniently ; thus 
whole gangs of slaves, consisting of many hundreds on each 
cotton plantation, are consigned to their graves once in seven 
years. The driver's lash impels them to excessive effort, and 
really causes their death, as much as the knife, or the pistol of 
the murderer, causes the death of his victim. They are 
hastened to premature graves, in order that their owners may 
enjoy the fruits of their toil, as much as the inoffensive 
merchant, when captured by the pirate, is compelled to " walk 
the plank." 

We have all seen notices of a convention of slave-holders, 
held some years since, in South Carolina, to determine upon 
the length of slave life most profitable to the master. That is, 
they met for the purpose of determining whether the master 
would gain greater profits from the labor of his slaves, by 
working them so hard as to produce death in seven years, or 
by treating them so humanely as to lengthen their lives to a 
longer period ! Upon full deliberation it was determined, that 
seven years was the period most beneficial to the master's 
interest. The feelings of humanity, or the principles of justice 
to the slave, did not enter into the computation. They forgot 
these considerations, as did our honorable Secretary of State, 
in his letters to Mr. Packenham, and to Mr. King. Now, Sir, 
the pirate thinks it most profitable for him to sacrifice the lives 
of his captives within an hour after he takes possession of 
them. The cotton planter regards it as more conducive to his 
interest, to hold his slaves under the torture of the overseer's 
whip for seven years. It is certain, that one is as much the 
cause of his victim's death, as the other; but as4o the relative 
degree of guilt which each incurs, I will express no opinion. 
I will leave that question for casuists of nicer discrimination 
than myself, to determine. 



ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 143 

Upon sugar plantations, however, the slaves are worked still 
harder, and the average life of slaves on sugar estates, is 
computed set Jive years. That is, the planters on those estates 
regard it more profitable to work their hands so severely as to 
cause their death in five years, and then to replace them by 
fresh purchases, than it would be to use them more leniently. 
The precise number of slaves thus sacrificed annually, cannot 
be ascertained. We know, however, that there are less 
restraints upon the increase of slave population, than there is 
among the free and enlightened portion of community. But the 
late census shows that the increase of the slaves in the slave 
States, between 1830 and 1840, was about four hundred thou- 
sand less, in proportion to their whole number, than that of the 
free population. But some of those slaves have fled to 
Canada, and to the free States ; and others have been trans- 
ported to Texas. Allowing forty thousand as the number of 
those who have thus left the slave States, and we shall still 
find a deficit of three hundred and sixty thousand in ten years ; 
thirty-six thousand annually, and three thousand per month, 
and of one hundred per day, as the number of persons whose 
lives are thus sacrificed, under the laws of our slave States, and 
of Congress. This tide of human gore is constantly flowing, and 
we are called upon to lend our official aid to increase and 
extend it. In order to effect this object, the honorable Secre- 
tary of State has urged upon us to consider the humane and 
moral hearings of slavery ~ It is, therefore, due to him that we 
examine them. 

Do we believe there is a Power above us, who will visit 
national sins and crimes with national judgments ? that He 
will visit upon this great people, the just penalty due to us for 
the suffering we have inflicted, the blood we have shed, and 
the murders that have been committed under our laws ? I am 
one of those who solemnly believe that transgression and 
punishment are inseparably connected by the inscrutable 
wisdom of God's providence. With this impression, I feel as 
confident that chastisement and tribulation, for the offences 
which we have committed against the down-trodden sons of 



144 ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 

Africa, await this people, as I do that justice controls the 
destinies of nations, or guides the power of Omnipotence. I 
" hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created 
equal ; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain 
inalienable rights ; that among these are life, liberty, and the 
pursuit of happiness." 

If our African brethren received their lives and liberty from 
God himself, what must be the guilt of those who step between 
God and their fellow men, and rob them of their God-given 
rights ? Sir, in the language of Mr. Jefferson, " I tremble for 
my country, when I reflect that God is just ! " I would not 
decide for others. " To his own master," each member on this 
floor, " must stand or fall." But I most solemnly declare, that 
I would as soon share in the guilt of the lawless pirate, or 
bathe my hands in human blood by direct murder, as I would 
aid in extending slavery and the slave-trade, by voting for the 
passage of the resolutions under consideration. In our own 
land, our African brethren now pine in bondage. Congress can- 
not relieve them. But, in the eloquent language of Jefferson, I 
would say, "When the measure of their tears shall be full, 
when their tears shall have involved Heaven itself in darkness, 
doubtless a God of justice will awaken to their distress," and " by 
his exterminating thunder, will manifest his attention to things 
of this world, and that they are not left to the guidance of 
blind fatuity." 

But the honorable Secretary assumes the doctrine, that this 
government is bound by the Constitution to maintain and up- 
hold slavery and the slave-trade ; that we, the people of the free 
States, are under constitutional obligations to participate in the 
crimes, and share in the guilt, to which I have made reference. 
Sir, I take issue with the honorable Secretary. I not only 
deny that such obligation rests upon our people of the free 
States, but I deny that the federal government possesses power, 
under the Constitution, to uphold slavery, or in any way to 
interfere with it. I have so often given my views on this point, 
that I feel no disposition to repeat them ; particularly after the 
able argument of my colleague from the Loraine district, (Mr. 



ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 145 

Hamlin). I hold to the doctrine which was maintained by 
southern and by northern men, on this subject, eight years since. 

At the last session of the 25th Congress, resolutions in 
regard to slavery were introduced to this hall, by a gentleman 
from 'New Hampshire, now a member of the other branch of 
our National Legislature, (Mr. Atherton) . It was then re- 
ported and believed that those resolutions were agreed upon in 
a caucus of the democratic party; that Mr. Calhoun was a 
member of that caucus, and that the resolutions were originally 
framed by him. One of these resolutions was in the following 
words : 

" Resolved, That this government is a government of limited powers ; that, by 
the Constitution of the United States, it has no power whatever over the institu- 
tion of slavery in the several States of this Union." 

For this resolution I voted, and so did one hundred and 
ninety-six members of this body ; indeed, there were only six 
members present who refused to vote for it, and those gentle- 
men objected rather to the practice of asserting abstract princi- 
ples, than to the doctrine of the resolution. 

During the same session, Mr. Clay, in the Senate, main- 
tained the same position. He declared that, — 

" Under the compromises of the Federal Constitution, no power whatever was 
granted to the general government over the institution of domestic slavery, 
except those which relate to taxation, representation, and the power to restore 
fugitive slaves to their owners." " All other powers (said he) were withheld by 
the several States, to be exercised exclusively at their own discretion." 

I mention Mr. Clay's sentiments, not for the reason that he 

is a whig, but because he is an eminent statesman, and that his 

sentiments at that time were universally approved by southern 

gentlemen, and almost equally so by northern statesmen. In 

his letter to the editor of the Lexington Observer, dated on the 

2d September last, Mr. Clay declares, — 

" That Congress has no power over the institution of slavery ; that the exist- 
ence, the maintenance, and the continuance of that institution depends exclu- 
sively upon the power and authority of the States in which it is situated." 

These are my sentiments. They are the sentiments of 
southern men and of northern men. They are the sentiments 
of our people generally. They were put forth and distinctly 

13 



146 ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 

maintained by the whigs of Virginia in their address published 
in September last. But a different doctrine is now held by 
the Executive and by the advocates of annexation. They now 
declare that the people of the free States are bound to spend 
their wealth, and shed their blood, in support of the institution 
which they hold in such general abhorrence. There are two 
parties in the United States ; one insists that we have power 
to sustain slavery, and the other urges that we have power to 
abolish it. But the great mass of our people, consisting of both 
the great political parties, hold to what I regard as the very 
obvious doctrine of the Constitution, that we have not the con- 
stitutional power to do either. 

Why, Sir, at the formation of the Constitution, an amend- 
ment was offered by a member from South Carolina, providing 
that " fugitive slaves should be arrested and delivered to their 
owners in the same manner as fugitives from justice." But Mr. 
Wilson, of Pennsylvania, and Mr. Sherman, of Connecticut, 
objected that such a provision in the Constitution would impli- 
cate the people of the free States in the support of slavery, and 
the proposition was withdrawn. Does the spirit of Wilson now 
inspire the sons of my native State ? Do they hold that insti- 
tution in such unmitigated detestation, that they will, in no 
respect, implicate themselves or their constituents in its sup- 
port ? Will they, like their immortal Franklin, " go to the 
very verge of the Constitution to suppress and abolish it ? " I 
will not doubt their regard for the inalienable rights of men, 
and the honor of our nation. Nor will I suspect that the suc- 
cessors of Sherman will prove recreant to the noble senti- 
ments which he maintained in the Convention that framed the 
Constitution. I cannot distrust any party from the free States. 
It is impossible for me to believe that any member north of 
Mason and Dixon's line, can be brought to vote for an exten- 
sion of the crimes, the wholesale murders, to which I have 
called the attention of the Committee. 

The momentous questions of Liberty and Slavery are now 
before the people of this nation. They have been forced upon 
us by the slave-holders of the South. Northern men cannot, 



ANNEXATION OF TEXAS. 147 

will not, shrink from the discussion. They have become the 
great absorbing topics in this hall, in most of our State legisla- 
tures, and by the people of the United States generally. Pub- 
lic indignation at these attempts to involve us in the crimes 
and disgrace of slavery^ is already awakened. It is rolling 
forward with an irresistible force ; which, ere long, will redeem 
and purify the people of the North from the crimes and the 
corroding influences of that blood-stained institution. The car 
of universal liberty is moving ; it has acquired a momentum 
that cannot be stopped ; and those who throw themselves before 
it, in order to obstruct its progress, will be crushed beneath its 
resistless power. 



JOINT OCCUPATION OF OREGON.' 



BY ANNEXING TEXAS, WE COMMENCED THE POLICY OF EXTENDING OUR 
TERRITORY — DUTY TO CONTINUE IT UNTIL THE BALANCE OF POWER BE- 
TWEEN THE SLAVE AND FREE STATES BE RESTORED — PROPHECY THAT 
THE PRESIDENT WILL SURRENDER A PORTION OF OUR TERRITORY IN 
OREGON. 

[President Polk in his inaugural address, and in his first annual message, 
declared our title to the whole of Oregon to be " clear and unquestionable;'''' 
the British government showed no disposition to recede from their position. 
The democratic party declared their intention to maintain our "claim to 
Texas, and to the whole of Oregon." In the Senate, leading members declared 
"war to be inevitable," and that "the hearts of the people must be prepared 
for that event." With these indications, a very general apprehension of war 
spread through the country, and our commercial men were alarmed. 

This was the situation of affairs, when the Committee on Foreign Affairs in 
the House of Representatives reported a resolution to terminate the joint occu- 
pancy of that territory, "and to take possession of it;" and the members 
generally spoke of war as probable. 

Mr. Giddings spoke upon this resolution ; and in taking the grounds which 
he assumed in the following speech, and in using the language he did, he was 
prompted by the conviction that a war with England would destroy southern 
slavery, and that the leading statesmen of the South were conscious of that 
fact. It is unnecessary to add that his prophecy on this subject was literally 
fulfilled.] 

Mr. Speaker, — When this subject was before us at a 
former session, our government had not adopted the policy of 
extending its powers by the acquisition of new territory. I 
then preferred that the Union, which had been formed by our 

* Speech on the resolution terminating the joint occupation of Oregon, and 
authorizing the President to take military possession thereof. Delivered in the 
House of Representatives, January 5, 1846. 



JOINT OCCUPATION OF OREGON. 149 

fathers of the Revolution, should remain and be perpetuated. 
I saw, or thought I saw, difficulties and dangers in attempting 
to bring other governments under our jurisdiction. I had seen 
in this hall, since the day on which I first entered it, a conflict 
of interest between different portions of the Union, which 
threatened the final overthrow of our government, if not con- 
fined to its then existing limits. Even then, a spirited contest 
had been carried on for many years between the southern and 
northern portions of the Union, in regard to our protective 
tariff. At one time it had actually arrayed in arms one mem- 
ber of the confederacy against the power of the federal govern- 
ment. That controversy still continues, and is likely to increase 
in interest. 

Another controversy, between the eastern and western por- 
tions of the Union, has long been carried on in respect to the 
disposition of our public lands. That controversy still con- 
tinues. But, Sir, a conflict of a more absorbing character, 
between the slave-holding interests of the South, and the advo- 
cates of freedom at the North, had been increasing and extend- 
ing among all classes of society, both in the free and in the 
slave States^ There was then a large balance of political 
power in favor of the free States ; while a liberal and perhaps 
commendable policy, on the part of the North, had given to the 
slave-holding territory an equal number of States, and of 
course an equal representation in the Senate with that of the 
free States. I then believed, notwithstanding all these sec- 
tional conflicts, that our Union might be preserved, if the 
government were confined to its then existing limits ; but I was 
most solemnly impressed with the opinion, that if our territory 
were extended, and the interests of different sections thereby 
rendered more conflicting, the permanency of the Union would 
be endangered. 

These views were based upon the irrevocable laws of 
nature. The soil and climate and products of Texas, are 
totally different from the soil and climate and products of 
New England ; but they are not more different than are the 
real interests of the people in those sections of the country. 
13* 



150 JOINT OCCUPATION OF OREGON. 

It will be as impossible for Congress by any laws of our enact- 
ment, to reconcile the interests of Texas and Massachusetts, as 
it would for us to compel the cotton and sugar of Texas to 
grow on New England soil, or the manufactures of New Eng- 
land to nourish in Texas. So, too, with Oregon. The princi- 
pal commerce of that territory must be with the Sandwich 
Isles and with China ; ours with Europe. No law of ours can 
reverse or reconcile these interests, founded upon the different 
positions of the Atlantic and Pacific coasts. We may extend 
our laws over Oregon ; we may admit her as a new State to 
our Union, as we have already admitted Texas ; but time will 
demonstrate to the people of Texas, and of Oregon, that they 
gain nothing by the association ; and our people of the East 
and the North will find, by future experience, that a union 
with Oregon and Texas will require of them the sacrifice of a 
portion of their own interests, without in any degree adding to 
the happiness of the human family. 

When these things shall be fully seen and felt by all portions 
of the Union, a separation will be inevitable, and such new 
confederations will then be formed as shall be thought more 
conducive to the general good. With these views, I preferred 
the independence of both Texas and Oregon, rather than see 
them united with us. I was fully aware that the tide of emi- 
gration which was setting from our western States to Oregon, 
would people that territory with those who understand the 
value of our free institutions, and who are devoted to the cause 
of civil liberty. Their wisdom and patriotism would soon erect 
a government there, modelled after our own, while it would be 
free from the errors to which ours is subjected. Under these 
circumstances and with these impressions, I felt that the great 
interests of all would be far better subserved by their becoming 
independent governments, than they would by their being mem- 
bers of our confederacy. Indeed, I felt that the policy of 
receiving them as members of our Union, would eventually 
prove fatal to our confederation. Nor do I now entertain any 
doubt whatever on that point. I therefore voted against ter- 
minating our joint occupation of Oregon, and against all politi- 



JOINT OCCUPATION OF OREGON. 151 

cal association with Texas. Yet the policy of territorial 
aggrandizement has been adopted. It has been done without 
my consent, and against my will. For the resulting conse- 
quences, I am not responsible. 

But since this subject of Oregon was before us during a 
former Congress, the policy of the nation has been changed. 
Indeed, the government itself has been changed in its essential 
elements; its fundamental principles have been overthrown. 
The Union, formed by our venerated predecessors, has been 
dissolved, and a new slave-holding confederacy, with a foreign 
government, has been formed. 

It is true that the action of this body and of the Executive, 
in regard to the annexation of Texas, has imposed no moral or 
political obligation upon the people of Ohio, or of any free 
State, to enter into this new slave-holding confederacy. But, 
from present indications, they will all submit and become parties 
to the new Union. This cannot be fully determined until after 
the senators and representatives of Texas shall take their seats 
in Congress. Then if Ohio shall elect members of Congress 
to come here, and act with those of Texas in passing laws to 
govern our people, we shall thereby become parties to the new 
compact. 

But, Sir, our State will become a party under the expecta- 
tion that the policy of adding new States shall be continued, 
until the balance of power shall be restored to the northern 
section of the Union. It is the annexation of Texas that has 
rendered the whole of Oregon necessary to restore that bal- 
ance of power. By the annexation of Texas, the slave States 
now have a majority in the Senate. They will continue to 
retain that majority, unless we add territory to our north- 
western border. By the annexation of Texas, the protection 
of the free labor of the North has been surrendered to the 
control of the slave power ; our constitutional rights, and the 
honor of our free States, are delivered over to the keeping of 
slave-holders. 

Indeed, our people of the free States have been politically 
bound, hand and foot, and surrendered to the rule and govern- 



152 JOINT OCCUPATION OF OREGON. 

ment of a slave-holding oligarchy. This has been done by 
the party in power, under the declared policy of obtaining 
Texas and retaining the whole of Oregon. But having obtained 
Texas, a portion of the party now propose to give up a part of 
Oregon. Their plan is, to add territory to the South, and sur- 
render up territory on the North, to increase their power, to 
decrease ours; to enlarge the area of slavery, to diminish the 
area of freedom. But while, by their acts, they are saying 
these things, they appear to have suddenly conceived a sort of 
holy horror of sectional views, and of sectional feelings. Last 
year they openly avowed their anxiety for Texas, in order to 
increase their political power. They have obtained Texas, and 
with it an increase of political power, and they have now sud- 
denly become impressed with the impropriety of sectional feel- 
ing. But if any thing be well calculated to excite sectional 
feelings, it is sectional injustice. 

We have had abundant demonstrations of southern feelings 
in regard to northern interests. We know it is vain for us to 
talk of maintaining the interests of the manufacturers of Penn- 
sylvania, New York, and New England, while the political 
power of the nation is swayed by those who have always been 
inexorably opposed to them. No man of reflection can for a 
moment believe that southern statesmen, who have from time 
immemorial striven to destroy all protection of northern labor, 
will now turn around, when they have the power in their 
hands, and, for the first time, lend their aid to sustain northern 
industry. 

No, Mr. Speaker, it becomes us to act like men ; to look our 
difficulties in the face, and to pursue the best mode of retriev- 
ing the advantages which have been thrown away. That can 
only be done by restoring the balance of power, by adding new 
States at the west and north-west. To admit new States on 
that border, we must have the territory out of which such 
States may be formed. But southern gentlemen, whose voices 
at the last session were heard, loud and long, in favor of Texas 
and the whole of Oregon, now see " a lion in the way." They 
were then chivalrous ; now they are all for peace. Then they 



JOINT OCCUPATION OF OREGON. 153 

waxed valiant ; now they " roar you gently as sucking doves." 
But a year ago their motto was, now or never ; at this time, 
" a masterly inactivity " is their maxim. Last year, they spoke 
in strains of fervid eloquence of the glory of extending the 
American sway over new territory, and of adding new States 
to our brilliant constellation ; now they call upon their northern 
friends to stop this mad career of extending the power of our 
government, and to leave the political control of the nation in 
their hands for a few years, until Great Britain shall quietly 
give up her claims to that territory. 

The northern portion of the democratic party^say, that they 
stand pledged to maintain our rights to the whole of Oregon by 
their Baltimore 'resolutions ; and they demand of their southern 
allies to aid in carrying out their solemn pledge. Here, then, 
is the issue between the southern and northern portions of the 
democratic party. The North desire to act in good faith, and 
the South insist upon a violation of their pledge ; and the 
whigs are called upon to decide which shall be done. I have 
no hesitation whatever in answering for myself. I shall vote 
to give the notice, and to terminate the joint occupancy of that 
territory. It is said, that the giving of notice will produce a 
war. But war, in my opinion, will not necessarily follow the 
notice ; still, it is said that the subsequent taking possession of 
the whole of Oregon will be followed by a war. I am inclined 
to that opinion. On this point, I differ from my venerable 
friend from Massachusetts, (Mr. Adams.) I do so, however, 
with the greatest diffidence ; for I have generally found myself 
in error when I have differed from him. Yet, being impressed 
with this opinion, I am bound to look to that as a possible, or 
rather as a probable result, from taking possession of the whole 
of Oregon. 

Under these circumstances, I must choose between a war 
with England on the one hand, and a supine, inglorious sub- 
mission to the slave-holding power on the other. I have seen 
enough of war to form an idea of the suffering it brings upon 
a nation. I have witnessed its devastating effects upon public 
morals, and the consequent misery which it inflicts upon those 



154 JOINT OCCUPATION OF OREGON. 

who are doomed to feel its curse. Yet, Sir, with all its 
horrors, revolting as they are to the feelings of humanity, I 
prefer meeting it for a few years rather than see the people of 
the free States sit down in quiet indifference under the control 
of the slave-holding power. 

I am aware that some who have reflected but little upon the 
subject will disagree with me on this point ; but when I reflect 
upon the manner in which this government has been used as 
the instrument to uphold the institution of slavery for the last 
half century ; to sustain the slave-trade in this district and on 
the southern coast ; the manner in which our army has been 
employed in murdering fugitive slaves ; and when I reflect that 
the people of the free States are thus involved in crimes of 
the deepest guilt, and of the greatest magnitude; when I 
reflect that the whole people of the nation are involved in the 
sacrifice of more than thirty thousand human lives annually to 
the Moloch of slavery ; when I look back but a few days to 
the vote of northern men in this hall to unite in political 
brotherhood with a State whose constitution provides for 
eternal slavery ; and when I reflect that this heaven-provoking 
iniquity has scarcely called forth a note of disapprobation from 
the public press ; — when these things rush upon the recollec- 
tion, I am compelled to say that I prefer war to seeing the 
people of the free States submit, in supine apathy, to the 
government of those accustomed to torture their fellow men 
into subjection, and who deal in human flesh. 

I have sons whom I tenderly love ; and I declare that I 
would rather see them fall in battle, contending for freedom, 
than to see our people of the North ingloriously surrender up 
the blood-bought privileges, won by the valor of our fathers, 
to the keeping of men who deny the " self-evident truths " on 
which our hopes of freedom are founded ; dooming those who 
shall bear my name, in coming time, to the degradation of liv- 
ing and dying the subjects of a slave-holding tyranny. 

I am aware that a war with England must be attended with 
great destruction to the commercial wealth of the North. 
Their ships will be captured, their ports blockaded, and their 



JOINT OCCUPATION OF OREGON. 155 

commerce for the time being destroyed. I fully appreciate the 
feelings and motives of the gentleman from Massachusetts, 
(Mr. Winthrop,) who the other day made so able and so elo- 
quent a speech in favor of peace. He represents the great 
commercial emporium of New England, and must of course 
feel deeply anxious on the subject. But it is well known that 
that gentleman was the first distinguished statesman of New 
England who publicly avowed his submission to the new slave- 
holding confederation with Texas. His State, like Ohio, Ver- 
mont, Rhode Island, and Connecticut, had declared, in sub- 
stance, that neither this body nor the federal government could 
impose any obligation upon the people of her State, to enter 
into this new union with Texas. The proposition is so obvi- 
ously correct, that I think few statesmen will deny it. No, Sir ; 
if Ohio shall unite in the proposed confederacy, it will be from 
the choice of her people, and not in consequence of any obliga- 
tion which the action of Congress has laid them under to unite 
with slave-holding Texas. 

If our gallant State shall become a party to the new compact, 
it will not be done because we* believe that the exercise of 
usurped powers by this government can transfer us from the 
Union formed by our fathers to a new confederation formed 
with a foreign people upon the principles of eternal slavery. 
The people of the free States are not yet the subjects of sale 
and transfer, like oxen in the shambles, or slaves in a southern 
market. I have at all times desired that the people of Ohio 
should not enter into the new union. Before Heaven, I think 
it would be far better for them not to do so ; and if my col- 
leagues agreed in opinion with me, no representative of Ohio 
would retain a seat in this hall beside those of Texas, until 
the voice of our people should be distinctly known. 

But the gentleman from Massachusetts yielded his assent, in 
advance, of the people of his State. He must have been 
aware of the position in which they would be placed, by becom- 
ing a party to this new compact. He was aware that the 
dominant party had pledged themselves to maintain our claim 



156 JOINT OCCUPATION OF OREGON. 

to the whole of Oregon. If dangers of a war now arise, from 
carrying out that policy, it will be no more than he had reason 
to expect. Indeed, I cannot believe that he would now be 
willing to leave the nation subject to the policy of the slave 
States. It is very questionable whether the commercial interest 
of his State would suffer more by a war than the manufactur- 
ing interest would, by being subjected to southern rule. I have 
very serious doubts whether a state of war would prove more 
destructive to New England commerce, than southern control 
would prove to New England manufactures. So far as the 
mere pecuniary interests of the free States are concerned, I 
think it quite immaterial whether we have war or peace. If 
Massachusetts shall voluntarily unite in the new confederacy, 
knowing the policy that controls it, she ought cheerfully to 
submit to the consequences. 

The leading merchants of Boston, distinguished for their 
i statesmanship, are said to have been among the first citizens 
of Massachusetts who declared "that the time for opposing 
the political connection with Texas had gone by." Being the 
first to submit to this gross usurpation of power, they ought to 
be the last to complain of consequences which must have been 
clearly foreseen. 

A distinguished citizen of Pennsylvania said to me yesterday, 
that the repeal of the tariff would be worse for the pecuniary 
interests of that commonwealth than a war with England. 
And I have no doubt that it would apply to the whole of New 
England with as much force as it would to Pennsylvania. I 
verily believe that the laborers of the free States would suffer 
less, in a pecuniary point of view, by a war with England, than 
they will by a quiet surrender of their interests to the control 
of the slave power of the South. I mention the laborers of 
the free States, including the agricultural interests of the 
West, as well as the manufacturing interests of New England 
and Pennsylvania. Indeed, a war with England would create 
a market for our provisions, and increase the price of our 
products generally. Let no one charge me with underrating 






JOINT OCCUPATION OF OREGON. 157 

the horrors of war. I am referring to the views and feelings of 
others ; I am referring to their arguments, and not to my x>wn 
sentiment. 

I am aware, however, that I shall be charged with enter- 
taining sectional views and sectional feelings. When, at the 
last session of Congress, I read the executive correspondence, 
speaking of southern institutions, southern interests, southern 
policy, and the extension of southern influence ; and wken I 
heard those sentiments reiterated in this hall, by almost every 
southern speaker, proclaimed by every southern political con- 
vention, and heralded forth in every southern newspaper, I 
began to think it was time for us to speak of northern interests, 
northern rights, and northern honor. 

When I reflect that the Executive has been deeply engaged 
in efforts, for the last year and a half, to extend and perpetuate 
slavery, and that Congress has lent its efforts to the same pur- 
pose, I really think it time for the lovers of liberty to begin to 
speak in favor of freedom, of those self-evident truths on which 
our fathers based their political faith. The slave power has 
compelled us to think and speak of our rights, and of the rights 
of man ; and if we tamely surrender them to the keeping of 
those who deny their existence, we may bid a final adieu, not 
only to our prosperity, but to our honor and to our political 
privileges. 

If war should result from carrying out this measure, as it 
may, the people of the North possess within themselves the 
means of defence. There, Sir, all are freemen, and all have 
an interest in sustaining our institutions and our laws. We 
have the industry, the energy, the patriotism, which may well 
defy the world in arms. But, Sir, our greatest difficulty will 
not consist in defending ourselves, or in taking Canada. No, 
Sir ; our principal burden will be the protection of the South ; 
the weak, helpless, dependent, slave-holding South. 

Should a war with England take place, Massachusetts and 

Ohio, and, indeed, each of the free States will be compelled to 

contribute double the amount of money and of blood to protect 

the miserable slave-holders of Texas that they will in defending 

U 



158 JOINT OCCUPATION OF OREGON. 

themselves. The millions, nay, the tens of millions, which we 
shall be compelled to expend, and the thousands of lives which 
must be sacrificed in defending »the heaven-provoking institu- 
tion of slavery,, and those who^ sustain'- it in Texas, will consti- 
tute a most striking illustration : o£ tiie"ai*gument urged upon us 
at the last session of Congress, — "'that* it was necessary to 
annex Texas in order to protect our soifth-westem frontier." 
The -protection of Texas will require fifty thousand troops, and 
an expenditure often millions of dollars 'annually.* 

But, Sir, we shall not only be compelled to protect Texas, 
but we shall be under the necessity^ of furnishing troops from 
the North to defend -.every slave** State, lying upon the Atlantic 
coast. Each of those States contains a large population, who 
are not only the most bitter and unrelenting foes to those who 
scourge and torture and oppress them ; but they are equally 
•hostile to the government that-- lends its aid and power to 
degrade and to hold them, in -bondage. In case of war, they 
will be more dangerous than four times their number of foreign 
enemies. % '■** '"■ £ •' 

We are alLawaTe that, in 1789, South Carolina sent a special 
delegation to 'the Continental Congress, informing that body 
that it required all her troops to protect the people against 
their slaves, and that that chivalrous State must depend upon 
her northern sisters to defend her against the common enemy. 
These scenes will again be acted, if we should engage in another 
war. In such case, all the slave States, collectively, would be 
unable to do more than protect themselves against their inter- 
nal foes, and northern troops must be relied upon to defend the 
coast, from the Delaware Capes to the Rio del Norte, the Mex- 
ican frontier,' aitd'the whole western boundary. The expense 
would be enormous ; .but; •an my opinion, not more destructive 
to the pecuniary interests of the free States than the free-trade 
policy of the present administration. I am fully aware that 
the southern portion of the Union must suffer most in case of 

* The expenditure by the United States, at this time, (1853,) is more than 
two millions dollars annually, merely to protect the people of that State against 
the Indians on their border. 



JOINT OCCUPATION OF OREGON. 159 

war. I have noticed the alarm manifested in southern papers, 
at the distant prospect of war with England. They now antici- 
pate destruction to the cotton-growing interest. Slave labor, 
they say, will be depreciated, and slave property will become 
valueless. That is doubtless correct. But this policy of ex- 
tending our territory is theirs, not mine. It originated with 
southern statesmen, and was forced upon the nation for the 

k express purpose of perpetuating slavery. If God, in his prov- 
idence, shall overrule their wicked designs to the subversion of / 
that curse, I shall greatly rejoice. 

f^ Last year, our southern friends expressed great anxiety for\ 
" Texas and the whole of Oregon." They now see difficulties 
before them ; dangers present themselves to the further pur- 
suit of their plan of territorial aggrandizement. They have 
suddenly called to mind the declaration of British statesmen, 
that " a war with the United States will be a war of emancipa- 
tion." They see in prospect the black regiments of the Brit- 
ish West India Islands landing among them, and their slaves 
nocking to the enemy's standard. Servile insurrections tor- 
ment their imaginations ; rapine, blood, and murder dance 
before their affrighted visions. They are now seen in every 
part of the hall, calling on whigs and democrats to save them 
from the dreadful consequences of their own policy. Well, 
Sir, I reply to them, — this is your policy, not ours ; you have 
forced us into it against our will and our utmost opposition ; 
you have prepared the poisoned chalice, and we will press it to 
your lips until you swallow the very dregs. 

I would not be understood as desiring a servile insurrection ;.» 
but I say to southern gentlemen that there are hundreds of 
thousands of honest and patriotic men who " will laugh at your 
calamity, and will mock when your fear cometh." If blood I 
and massacre should mark the struggle for liberty, of those who- 
for ages have been oppressed and degraded, my prayer to the- 
God of Heaven shall be, that justice, stern, unyielding justice, 
may be awarded to both master and slave. I desire that every 
human being may enjoy the rights with which the God of 
nature has endowed him. If those rights can be regained by 



160 JOINT OCCUPATION OF OREGON. 

the down-trodden sons of Africa in our southern States, by 
quiet and peaceful means, I hope they will pursue such peace- 
ful measures. But, if they cannot regain their God-given 
rights by peaceful measures, I nevertheless hope they will 
regain them ; and, if blood be shed, I should certainly hope 
that it might be the blood of those who stand between them 
and freedom, and not the blood of those who have long been • 
robbed of their wives and children, and all they hold dear m ^^ 
V life. 
^*^' It is true, that when those scenes shall occur, northern free- 
fmen, our sons and neighbors, must march to Texas, and bare* % 
their breasts to the shafts of battle, in a soul-degrading defence 
of slavery. In such a cause, who would not be a coward ? 
Our fathers fought for the inali enable rights of man ; our sons 
must face the cannon's mouth in defence of slavery. Should 
the black regiments of the "West Indies land upon our southern 
coast, our freemen of the North will be placed in a position, the 
contemplation of which is most revolting to the feelings of 
humanity. For the people of the free North to march to our 
southern States, and stand between the emancipated slaves of 
the West Indies and southern slave-holders, and defend them, 
while they flog their bondmen into submission, will be degra- 
dation without a parallel, except it be found in the quiet sub- 
mission of our people to the political control of those who buy 
and sell their fellow men, and make merchandise of human 
flesh. 

Should the scenes to which I have alluded take place, one 
great advantage would result. Perhaps no statesman doubts 
that a war with England must prove the death of slavery. 
The British government now have no slaves in their West 
India Islands, as in the last war, to restrain them from raising 
the flag of emancipation. The paralyzing effects which that 
institution exerts upon the physical energies of the nation 
would be exhibited to the world. Our people of the North 
would be constrained to look upon the evil as it really is. 

The slave power would lose its charm ; our citizens of the 
North would be aroused from the lethargy which, for half a 



JOINT OCCUPATION OF OREGON. 161 

century, has held their sensibilities in a torpid inactivity toward 
the oppressed of our land. We should then find means to sever 
the cords which have so long, unconstitutionally, bound us to 
the putrescent carcass of slavery. Great Britain would not be 
likely again to pay southern slave-holders twelve hundred thou- 
sand dollars for human cattle, who shall have strayed from 
their owners, as was done at the close of the last war. 

But another consequence would, in all human probability, 
result from a war with England. We should obtain the Cana- 
das, Nova Scotia, and New Brunswick, adding at least six new 
States to the northern portion of the Union, each possessing 
double the population of Texas. These States would restore 
to the North that balance of power which was surrendered up 
by the annexation of Texas. It would be in strict accordance 
with the policy avowed by the party in power, and which was 
in part carried into practice by the annexation of Texas. 

I therefore say to the members of that party, carry out your 
policy ! By adopting it, you have brought us under the power 
of the slave-holding States. Continue your policy, and you 
will relieve us from our present position, and restore to us the 
rights you have taken from us. I will vote to render you 
every facility for carrying forward your plans ; it being under- 
stood at all times, that I regard the measure as ultimately fatal 
to the Union, but not as immediately so as it would be to 
leave the government where it now is. The responsibility 
must rest upon those who have avowed and adopted the sys- 
tem. To them belong the honors and the responsibilities of 
the policy. We claim no portion of one, nor will we share in 
the other. 

But, Mr. Speaker, I am unwilling to resume my seat until I' 
express my perfect conviction that this policy cannot be carried 
out by the party in power. The northern democrats will soon 
be deserted by their southern slave-holding allies. They have 
been betrayed by the slave power. Texas is admitted, and the 
southern wing of the democratic party will now desert their 
northern friends, and leave Oregon where it is. 

If this resolution be adopted, the Executive will find means- 
14* 



162 JOINT OCCUPATION OF OREGON. 

to escape from the dilemma into which this southern policy has 
precipitated him. It is most obvious to my judgment, that he 
cannot be driven into a war with England. As I have already 
stated, a war with that nation must prove the total overthrow 
of slavery. Every reflecting statesman must see this as clearly 
as any event can be foretold by human perception. I do not 
think the slave-holding portion of the democratic party were 
aware, that the carrying out of their Baltimore resolutions 
would sacrifice that institution. They rather believed that, by 
obtaining Texas, the price of human flesh would be enhanced, 
and slavery supported. The consequences of seizing upon 
" the whole of Oregon" were not considered. Mr. Polk, in his 
inaugural address, and in his annual message, evidently over- 
looked the momentous effect which his twice-declared policy 
would produce upon the slave interest, to which he is indissolu- 
bly wedded. He, and his cabinet, and his party, have made a 
fatal blunder. They will soon discover their error, and will 
recede from their position. With the same degree of confi- 
dence that I have in my own existence, I declare that they will, 
before the nation and the world, recede from their avowed 
policy, and will surrender up all that portion of Oregon north 
of the forty -ninth parallel of latitude, or let the subject remain 
as it now is. 

I wish to place this prediction on record for future reference. 
Nor would I confine my remarks to the democratic party. Those 
southern slave-holding whigs who voted for Texas will now, if 
necessary, turn round and vote to give up a part of Oregon. 
It is a question between the slave States and the free States ; 
and the vote when taken will, with few exceptions, exhibit that 
character. The great master-spirit of southern policy (Mr. 
Calhoun) has left his retirement, and taken his position in the 
other end of the capitol, for the avowed purpose of defeating 
the identical policy, the promotion of which occupied his whole 
attention only twelve months since. He is an adept in this 
political versatility. He will, however, carry the President 
and the southern statesmen generally with him ; and will defeat 
the measure to which he and his party stand solemnly pledged. 



JOINT OCCUPATION OF OREGON. 163 

Yes, Sir ; should this resolution pass both Houses of Con- 
gress, the President will find means to give up a part of Ore- 
gon, or even the whole of it, rather than subject the institution 
of slavery to the sure destruction which a war with England 
would bring upon it. I again repeat, what I have endeavored 
to impress upon gentlemen, that this policy is not mine ; I wash 
my hands of it. But by carrying it out, we shall place the 
northern and southern portions of the Union upon terms ap- 
proximating to equality. And when, from its broad extent, this 
Republic, like the Roman Empire, shall fall asunder of its own 
weight, the free States will redeem and purify themselves from 
the foul disgrace of supporting an institution which has excited 
the contempt of infidel nations, and dishonored us in the eyes 
of the Christian world. 



INDIAN TREATIES.* 



THAT OF EIGHTEEN HUNDRED AND FORTY-FOUR EXAMINED — EFFORTS TO 
KEEP ITS CHARACTER FROM THE PUBLIC — NOT SEEN BY MEMBERS OF 
THE HOUSE — OUR POLICY IN COMPELLING THE INDIANS TO RETURN 
FUGITIVE SLAVES EXPOSED. 

[The stipulations contained in our treaties with the Creek Indians, by which 
they undertook to return the fugitive slaves of Georgia, was the principal 
cause of the Florida war, as shown by the speech on that subject in 1841. 
After the attention of the public had been called to this subject, every possible 
effort of the Executive appears to have been put forth to keep secret every 
movement in relation to those fugitives. The fact that dangers of a frontier 
war existed in 1842, 1843, and 1844, was known; but the cause or the 
sources from which such dangers arose was not known to the people. All 
official information relating to it was kept silently in the Department. The 
treaty alluded to in the following speech, although entered into in 1844, was 
unknown to the members of the House, when called on to appropriate money 
to carry out its provisions. While this treaty lay concealed in the archives 
of the Senate, the author found means to get a copy of it, and in the follow- 
ing speech endeavored to expose its character. He was replied to by the 
chairman of the Committee of Ways and Means, who reported the bill; but 
that gentleman made no denial of any thing contained in the speech of Mr. 
Giddings, thereby confirming all that is expressed in the following remarks.] 

Mr. Chairman, — When I came to the House this morn- 
ing, I had not the most distant idea of addressing the com- 
mittee ; yet there are some points involved in this discussion, 
which I am unwilling to have passed over in silence. The bill 
before us provides for the payment of forty thousand dollars, 
under our treaty with the Creeks and Seminoles of 1845. That 
treaty has never been published, and gentlemen are not in- 

* Speech on the Indian Appropriation Bill. Delivered in Committee of the 
whole House on the state of the Union, February 18, 1846. 



INDIAN TREATIES. 165 

formed of its contents. The treaty itself is not only kept from 
us, but the circumstances which led to it; the consideration 
which the United States have received for the sums which we 
are called on to appropriate, are hidden from our view. Under 
these circumstances, my friend from New York (Mr. Culver) 
offers his amendment, forbidding the payment of any portion 
of the money, in consideration of the capture of fugitive slaves, 
or as a compensation for fugitive slaves who have been recap- 
tured. 

Gentlemen have expressed doubts whether the payment of 
the money stipulated in the treaty was for slaves, or for the 
capture of slaves. If their suspicions be correct, the amend- 
ment will be harmless. It can do no injury, in any event. It 
is offered as a precautionary measure, and the mover says he 
has satisfactory reasons to believe the payments are intended 
as a compensation for slaves. No man denies his statements, 
or professes to dispute the facts he has set forth. But mem- 
bers appear willing to vote away the funds, not because they 
are informed on the subject, but because they are not informed ; 
not because they know the appropriation to be proper, but 
because they are unable to say whether it be right or wrong. 
It appears to me that we have arrived at a new and extraordi- 
nary era in the legislation of our country. The Executive 
demands this money, and calls on us to grant it ; but withholds 
from us, and from the country, all information concerning the 
objects, or consideration for which it is to be paid. I say it is 
withheld ; for the Executive has possession of the treaty, and 
of the correspondence which shows the circumstances that led 
to it, as well as the consideration on which it is founded. Yet 
they are to the members here a " sealed book." Gentlemen 
are as ignorant of them as they are of the decrees of the 
Grand Sultan. 

The chairman of the Committee of Ways and Means pos- 
sesses a copy of the treaty ; but I think I may safely say, that 
» he never showed it to any member of this House, until since 
this debate commenced. I, too, have a copy, which has been 
examined by my friend who offered this amendment, and a 



166 INDIAN TREATIES. 

colleague, (Mr. Delano,) now confined to his room by indis- 
position, but who, if his health had permitted, would have 
favored us with the views which he entertains of this mysteri- 
ous transaction. With the exception of the honorable chair- 
man of the Committee of Ways and Means, my friend from 
New York, (Mr. Culver,) and myself, no member now present 
ever saw or read this cabalistic treaty, to which I intend here- 
after to call the attention of the committee. The manner in 
which I obtained a copy is of no importance. I have it. It 
bears date on the 4th of January, 1845, at the Creek agency, west 
of the Mississippi. On the 6th of February, 1845, I informed 
this body, that a slave-dealing compact, called a treaty, had 
been entered into between the United States and those Indians. 
In a speech which I made during the discussions of that day, 
I pointed out the circumstances, and related the historical 
incidents which had led to the negotiation of this treaty. I 
then declared, as I now emphatically assert, that this treaty 
was negotiated for the sole purpose of arranging difficulties, 
and satisfying claims arising from the capture of fugitive 
slaves, and for the purpose of paying for such slaves. 

On the 5th of March, the treaty was approved by the Sen- 
ate. From the time of its approval to this hour, it has been 
entombed in the Executive archives, and kept from the view 
of gentlemen who are now called to act officially under it. 
The Executive organ in this city, to which we look for the 
publication of such important treaties, has never hinted at its 
ratification or existence. The announcement which I made 
more than a year since, that such a treaty had been negotiated 
for the purpose of closing up an old slave-dealing transaction 
between our government and those Indians, attracted but little 
attention, and the country is now unconscious that such a 
treaty is in being ; and until the reading of the bill before us, 
even the members of this House generally were equally unin- 
formed respecting it. Sir, why this secrecy ? Why has the 
treaty been withheld from us and from the people ? Why are the 
circumstances which led to its negotiation kept from us ? Why 
are we not permitted to know the consideration on which we 



INDIAN TREATIES. 167 

are to pay so much money ? Why are two hundred and nine- 
teen members on this floor kept in profound ignorance on the 
subject of this treaty ? 

No blame can attach to gentlemen here for not having seen 
it. The responsibility rests with those who have had posses- 
sion of it, and whose duty it was to publish it, but who have 
kept it concealed. This suppression of the treaty, and the 
facts connected with it, bespeaks its suspicious character in 
language not to be misunderstood. Although on two former 
occasions I have related most of the circumstances which led 
to the negotiation of the treaty, yet I presume they are recol- 
lected by few members now present, and it seems proper that 
I should repeat them. On the 7th August, 1790, the United 
States entered into a treaty with the Creek Indians, by which 
they agreed to deliver up to the officers of the United States 
such negroes as resided among them. These negroes had 
during, and subsequent to, the revolutionary war, fled from 
their masters in Georgia, and by this treaty the federal gov- 
ernment attempted to recover and return them to their owners. 
The Indians failed to deliver up the negroes, and the treaty of 
Colerain was negotiated in 1796. 

At the time of entering into this treaty, the Indians renewed 
their covenant to deliver up the slaves ; and did, at the time of 
entering into it, deliver such of them as were resident in what 
were called the " upper towns." But many of the negroes had 
gone into Florida, and had settled and intermarried with the 
Seminoles. The Creeks could not, therefore, obtain them, and 
of course were unable to deliver them to the agents of our 
government. The planters of Georgia became clamorous for 
their slaves, and in 1821 the treaty of "Indian Spring" was 
negotiated, under the supervision of commissioners appointed 
by the executive of Georgia. By the terms of this treaty, the 
Indians agreed to pay for the slaves, and left in the hands of our 
government two hundred and fifty thousand dollars for that pur- 
pose ; all which was subsequently paid over to the Georgia 
claimants. 

The Creeks having thus paid to our government at least 
three times the value of these mothers and children and fathers, 



168 INDIAN TREATIES. 

now claimed them as their property, believing they had ob- 
tained a good title to them. But the Seminoles being con- 
nected with them in all the relations of domestic life, refused 
to deliver them up as slaves. The Creeks removed west of the 
Mississippi ; but the Seminoles dared not go, fearing that their 
people would be seized by the Creeks as slaves. They were 
at length compelled, by the power of our arms, to abandon 
their homes in Florida, and submit to be carried to the Indian 
country -in the West. Soon as they crossed the western line of 
Arkansas, they stopped upon lands owned by the Cherokees, 
and refused to go to the country assigned to them, as it was 
under the jurisdiction of the Creeks, knowing they would be- 
come subject to Creek laws, if they entered it. The Chero- 
kees were offended in consequence of the intrusion of the 
Seminoles. And if gentlemen will refer to the National Intel- 
ligencer of the 27th January, 1845, they will find that it 
required all the influence of the Executive to prevent hostili- 
ties between those Indians. 

These difficulties continued during four or five years next pre- 
vious to the making of this treaty. The cause of the difficulty 
was not published through the papers, but may be learned 
from the correspondence on file in the bureau of Indian Affairs. 
At times, the excitement was so great as seriously to threaten 
the peace of the frontier, as is set forth in the preamble to the 
treaty, which I shall soon read to the committee ; and is more 
abundantly manifested by letters and reports in the War 
Department. These difficulties arose entirely in consequence of 
our attempts to return the fugitive slaves of Georgia. These 
are the circumstances which led to the treaty. The transaction, 
from beginning to end, in its generals and in its details, was a 
slave-dealing business, disgraceful to those who managed it, 
and disreputable to the government which authorized and 
approved it. These circumstances are briefly referred to in 
the following portion of the preamble to the treaty, to wit : 

" Whereas many of the Seminoles have settled and are now living in the 
Creek country, while others, constituting a large portion of the tribe, have 
refused to make their homes in any part thereof, assigning as a reason that 
they are unwilling to submit to Creek laws and government, and that they are 
apprehensive of being deprived by the Creek authorities of their property : 



INDIAN TREATIES. 169 

" And whereas repeated complaints having been made to the United States 
government, that those of the Seminoles who refuse to go into the Creek coun- 
try have, without authority or right, settled upon lands secured to other tribes, 
and that they have committed numerous and extensive depredations upon the 
property of those upon whose lands they have intruded." 

I desire to call particular attention to that portion of the 
preamble which recites, that " a large portion of the tribe are 
apprehensive of being deprived by the Creeks of their pro- 
perty." The Jesuitical language made use of is only worthy 
of the transaction. The term "property" instead of " slaves," 
is calculated to deceive the casual reader. But these people 
were never held or regarded as slaves by the Seminoles. They 
had fled to the Seminole country, and had voluntarily settled 
with them, intermarried with them, and become a part of the 
tribe, and were no more the property of the Indians, than the 
Indians were the property of the negroes ; nor were they at 
any time claimed as slaves by the Seminoles. I deny that any 
instance can be shown where the Seminoles expressed any 
apprehension that the Creeks would take from them either 
property or slaves, other than those negroes who lived among 
them in perfect freedom, but who were claimed by the Creeks 
as property. It is true that, in some of the documents, they 
are referred to as " negro property," but generally they are 
called negroes. 

I will now call the attention of gentlemen to that portion of 
the preamble which sets forth the considerations on which the 
treaty is based, and the objects for which it was entered into. 
It is in the following words : 

" Now, therefore, in order to reconcile all difficulties respecting location and 
jurisdiction, to settle all disputed questions which have arisen, or may here- 
after arise in regard to rights of property, and especially to preserve the 
peace of the frontier, seriously endangered by the restless and warlike spirit of 
the intruding Seminoles, the parties to this treaty have agreed to the following 
stipulations." 

The first consideration moving the government of these 
United States to enter into this treaty is, to " reconcile all diffi- 
culties respecting location and jurisdiction." 

In pursuance of this consideration the treaty provides, in the 
two first articles, as follows : 
15 



170 INDIAN TREATIES. 

" Article I. The Creeks agree that the Seminoles shall be entitled to settle 
in a body, or separately, as they please, in any part of the Creek country ; that 
they shall make their OAvn town regulations, subject, however, to the general 
control of the Creek council in which they shall be represented ; and, in short, 
that no distinction shall be made between the two tribes, in any respect, except 
in the management of their pecuniary affairs, in which neither shall interfere 
with the other. 

" Article II. The Seminoles agree, that those of their tribe who have not 
done so before the ratification of this treaty, shall immediately thereafter re- 
move to and permanently settle in the Creek country." 

These two articles fully " reconcile all difficulties respecting 
location," by placing the Seminoles within the Creek territory, 
to which they agree to remove immediately, and to settle per- 
manently therein. It reconciles all questions of jurisdiction, 
by giving the Seminoles power " to make their own town regu- 
lations subject to the Creek council." The committee will 
bear in mind, that the sole reason why the Seminoles did not 
go to the Creek country, in the first instance, was the dread of 
placing these people, some of whom were their wives and chil- 
dren, within the jurisdiction of the Creeks. These circum- 
stances arose solely from the fact, that our government had 
extorted money from the Creeks to pay the slave-holders of 
Georgia for their negroes. 

And now, to correct this slave-dealing error of the govern- 
ment, the bill before us grants twenty-six thousand dollars for 
the removal of the Seminoles from the Cherokee to the Creek 
country, and for supporting them six months after their 
removal. 

But, it may be asked, why should our government interfere ? 
Why not let the Indians arrange their own difficulties? I 
answer, the difficulty was brought about by the interference of 
our government in behalf of slavery; and, if hostilities had 
arisen from it, our nation would have been still more disgraced 
than it now is. To save this slave-mongering administration 
from further disgrace, our constituents are compelled to pay 
this item of twenty-six thousand dollars. The second consider- 
ation set forth in the preamble is, " To settle all disputed ques- 
tions which have arisen, or may hereafter arise, in regard to 
the rights of property." This was the great and principal 



INDIAN TREATIES. 171 

object of the treaty, and is provided for in the third article, 
which reads as follows : 

" It is mutually agreed by the Creeks and Seminoles, that all contested cases 
between the two tribes, concerning the right of property, growing out of sales 
or transactions that may have occurred previous to the ratification of this 
treaty, shall be subject to the decision of the President of the United States." 

If gentlemen will refer to the National Intelligencer of the 
latter part of January, 1845, they will find it stated, on the 
authority of an officer from the Indian country, that an arrange- 
ment of great importance had been made with the Creeks and 
Seminoles, by which all trials involving the right growing out 
of sales or transactions which had occurred prior to the arrange- 
ment, should be decided by the President. And the writer 
adds : 

" This is an important clause, and covers a delicate question. The Seminoles 
objected heretofore to coming under the Creek government, lest they should be 
molested in their negro property, and were fearful of the administration of 
Creek laws. All unsettled questions about the titles to negroes in possession of 
Seminoles, previous to the ratification of this treaty, will be settled by the 
President." 

All allusion to the original cause of this difficulty was 
avoided, but the material facts to which I have adverted are 
hinted at ; and all cavil, as to the use of the word property, may 
be set at rest, by referring to the papers of that date. The 
President of this great and free Republic is to sit as arbitrator 
between these savages, and is to decide who shall have the 
body of this mother, and to whom that child shall belong ; that 
the father shall be this man's slave, and the wife shall be deliv- 
ered to that master. Sir, the subject is most revolting to the 
feelings of humanity. But I feel humbled, when I reflect that 
the people of our free States are to furnish the funds for this 
slave-dealing transaction ; and that northern representatives 
are, by their votes, to involve our people in this degradation. 

By reference to the sixth article of this treaty, it will be 
seen that we are to pay to the Seminoles ninety thousand four 
hundred dollars, in addition to the twenty-six thousand for their 
removal and subsistence. This is the compensation which they 



172 INDIAN TREATIES. 

are to receive for delivering up such of their people as the 
President shall direct to be held as slaves by the Creeks. But 
it was evidently expected that about one half would remain 
with the Seminoles ; and would, therefore, be lost to the 
Creeks, for the Creeks regard them as their property. For 
these, too, we are to pay the Creeks one hundred and twenty 
thousand dollars ; making in all two hundred and ten thousand 
four hundred dollars which we are to pay for these slaves, 
according to the treaty, but which will be cut off, if we carry 
out the principles of the proposed amendment.* 

And now the question is distinctly before us. Will we 
thrust our hands into the pockets of our constituents, and take 
this money, and pass it over to a slave-dealing President, to be 
expended in paying for the bodies of husbands and wives and 
children ? Are the representatives from the free States pre- 
pared to enter into this business of huckstering in human flesh ? 
Shall we involve our constituents in this deep and damning 
crime of trading in the image of our God ? Our voles must 
answer these questions. 

The third consideration mentioned in the preamble of the 
treaty is, " to preserve the peace of the frontier." But the 
people will ask, how came the peace of the frontier in danger ? 
I answer, it became endangered by these slave-dealing trans- 
actions. These people were living with the Seminoles. Our 
government, in violation of the Constitution, in defiance of jus- 
tice and of humanity, put forth its influence to force them back 
into slavery. Unable to do that, we compelled the Creeks to 
pay for them ; and these barbarous Indians, believing that a 
title thus derived from a Christian nation must be valid, claimed 
them as slaves, and determined to have possession of them ; 



* Subsequently to the delivery of this speech, Congress refunded to the 
Creek Indians one hundred and forty-one thousand dollars which had been 
improperly paid to the slave-holders, out of the two hundred and fifty thousand 
retained under the treaty of Indian Spring. Thus were three hundred and fifty- 
one thousand dollars drawn from the laborers of this nation, \o carry out this 
effort to return the fugitive slaves of Georgia, beside the Seminole war, which 
cost some forty millions more. 



INDIAN TREATIES. 173 

while the Seminoles and negroes were determined to resist the 
demand. Thus, in the words of the preamble, the peace of the 
frontier became " seriously endangered." The danger was a 
necessary consequence of the slave-catching efforts of our gov- 
ernment, to which I have alluded. Thus every consideration 
set forth in the preamble of this treaty is connected with, and 
forms a part of, the history of these attempts of our government 
to uphold and sustain the slavery of the South. 

Mr. Chairman, I have now done with the facts. If I have, 
in any respect, failed to state them fairly, as they exist, I will' 
thank the chairman of the Committee of Ways and Means (Mr. 
McKay) to correct any error into which he may suppose me to 
have fallen, and for that purpose I will gladly yield to him the 
floor. [Mr. Giddings, after a short pause, resumed.] I re- 
ferred to the able gentleman at the head of the financial com- 
mittee, for the reason that he reported the bill before us, and is 
bound fully to understand the facts connected with this subject. 
He is, also, the only member who has had an opportunity of 
fully examining this treaty ; but, as he remains silent under my 
appeal, I will feel under deep obligations to any other member 
who will point out any error whatever in the relation I have 
given. [Mr. Giddings again paused, and then remarked] : If 
gentlemen will examine the documents to which I have referred, 
and the correspondence in the Department of War, they will 
find many other interesting facts, to which I have not time to 
refer, but which show the untiring efforts of this nation to 
uphold this institution of slavery, so detested by all civilized 
and Christian people. 

Before I proceed farther on this point, I desire to repeat 
what I have often asserted, that every attempt of this govern- 
ment to sustain the slavery of the South, either by the recap- 
ture of fugitive slaves or otherwise, is a direct violation of our 
Constitution, an encroachment upon the rights of the free 
States, an offence against the laws of God, and an outrage 
upon humanity. I have no time now to go into an extended, 
examination of the subject. 

15* 



174 INDIAN TREATIES. 

An eminent statesman of our own times (Henry Clay) lias 
declared that — 

" The existence, the maintenance, and continuance of domestic slavery 
depends exclusively upon the power and authority of the States in which it 
exists." 

This, Sir, is the doctrine of the Constitution. It is whig 
doctrine, and the only true whig doctrine.* Agreeably to it, I 
say, "the existence of slavery (in Georgia) should have de- 
pended entirely upon the power and authority of that State." 
If her people could not support it, let it cease. They had no 
right to call on the people of the free States, or upon Congress, 
to aid them in sustaining it ; for, as Mr. Clay most distinctly 
and emphatically declares, " Congress has no power or authority 
over the institution of slavery." 

To appropriate the moneys proposed in this bill to pay for 
these slaves, will be as clearly a violation of our federal com- 
pact as it would be for us to abolish slavery in Georgia, or 
establish it in Massachusetts. If this government possesses the 
power to deal in slaves, we may establish a slave-market in 
Boston, or in New York, and set up business, on government 
account, at any other point we please. If we possess the 
power to tax the people of the free States to the amount of 
two hundred thousand dollars, to be expended in payment of 
slaves, as contemplated by this treaty, we may tax them two 
hundred millions for the same purpose. The question before 
us is one of principle, and not of amount. 

Had our , government entered into a treaty with those 
Indians, and agreed to pay them two hundred thousand dollars 
for assisting the slaves of Georgia to escape from bondage, we 
should all of us have pronounced such a treaty unconstitutional ; 
and I do not believe that a member of this body would have 
voted to appropriate a single dollar in pursuance of it. Yet 
the unconstitutionality of such a treaty would have been no 

* This doctrine of Mr. Clay was, at that time, regarded as the doctrine of the 
whig party ; and it was by professing to maintain those principles, that they 
retained in their ranks a large body of the anti-slavery men of the free States. 



INDIAN TREATIES. 175 

more obvious than is that of the treaty before us. It is a per- 
fectly clear proposition, that, if the government have power to 
restore slaves, they have the same power to entice them away ; 
and, if they have power to pay out the money of the people for 
one purpose, they have equal power to pay it out for the other. 

When a fugitive slave enters our State, we regard him as a 
person, and not as property. Under our laws, he may sue, or 
be sued ; he may be rewarded for his virtuous deeds, and be 
punished for his crimes. Indeed, he enjoys all the rights 
which others possess, except that he is liable to be seized by 
his master, and carried back into slavery. We feed, clothe, 
and lodge him, knowing him to be a slave. We teach him his 
rights, show him the road to Canada, and furnish him with the 
means to get there. We furnish him with the means of de- 
fending himself, in the same manner that we furnish others 
with weapons. In short, we treat him in all respects as we do 
other persons, except defending him against his master, or 
secreting him. 

I repeat, that I am most happy in seeing able lawyers and 
statesmen from the South now before me. They must feel a 
deep interest on the subject, and if they deny any position 
which I have laid down, I call upon them to correct me. This 
is the place where these grave matters should be discussed. 
Let it be done before the House, and before the country. Let 
truth be sent forth to the people of the nation, and let them be 
correctly informed on a matter so vital to both sections of the 
Union. I certainly can have no object in the maintenance of 
error, and hope I may be set right, if any slave-holding mem- 
ber shall believe me to be wrong on these points. I make 
these remarks in order that they may go forth to assist our 
people in forming correct opinions of their rights on this sub- 
ject, so important to humanity. The moral feelings of our peo- 
ple are correct. Were they not restrained by the Constitution, 
they would be as anxious to hang the man who catches a slave 
in our free States, as they would be to hang him who goes to 
Africa and commits the same crime. They believe the turpi- 
tude of seizing a slave in Ohio, and taking him back to inter- 



176 INDIAN TREATIES. 

minable bondage, to be as great as it is to seize the same man 
in Africa and bring him into slavery. 

Mr. McDowell, of Ohio, inquired of Mr. Giddings, if he, 
as a lawyer, had not counselled masters in regard to obtaining 
their fugitive slaves. 

Mr. Giddings. Never; no, never. Why, Sir, you cannot 
induce a slave-catcher to come into that civilized and Christian 
portion of the State where I reside. You might as easily 
induce a Hottentot to enter a church. 

"Whilst these are the rights secured to us under the Constitu- 
tion, we have annually, for the last twenty years, made appro- 
priations from the public treasury, to pay for the capture of 
fugitive slaves ; and representatives from the free States regu- 
larly vote for them without objection. Holding the clear and 
indisputable right of being exempt from the expense of sla- 
very, the people of the free States, within the last ten years, 
have probably paid more than thirty millions of dollars for its 
support. 

The proposition is plain and definite in its character, admit- 
ting of no doubtful construction. It prohibits the payment of 
any portion of the moneys appropriated by this bill for the 
recapture of fugitive slaves. Can northern men hesitate, or 
falter upon such a question ? Will any one vote to involve 
the freemen of Ohio, or of any other free State, in the sup- 
port, in the crimes, in the disgrace of slavery ? The record of 
our votes will express to coming generations the sentiments 
which we cherish, and the principles which guide our action. 



THE MEXICAN WAR.* 



STANDING ARMY — MILITARY CONQUESTS DANGEROUS TO THE CONQUER- 
ORS—PRESIDENT'S STATEMENTS ERRONEOUS — REVOLUTION OF OUR GOV- 
ERNMENT—LOSS OF HUMAN LIFE FORETOLD — DEVOTION OF MEXICANS 
TO THEIR GOVERNMENT— WAR COMMENCED BY THE PRESIDENT. 

[The Mexican war had been commenced by the President's ordering the 
army to the Rio Grande, with permission to General Taylor to cross that 
stream, and commence the conquest of Mexico, if he thought proper. Several 
battles were fought before any reference had been made to Congress on the 
subject, and General Taylor was in Mexico with his army long before the 
President made any communication to Congress respecting the situation of 
our army. 

On the llth May, 1846, he sent a message to each House of Congress, 
stating the commencement of hostilities. Resolutions declaring war " to exist 
by the act of Mexico " were forced through the House of Representatives 
under the previous question, thereby prohibiting all debate. The opponents of 
the war felt indignant at being thus constrained to vote on the momentous 
question of war without any expression of their views. 

The next day, the House went into committee to consider the above bill, 
when Mr. Giddings availed himself of that opportunity to express his views in 
relation to the war.] 

Mr. Chairman, — While holding a seat upon this floor, I 
have ever opposed all increase of the army and of the navy. 
During the short period of our national existence, we have in 
time of peace expended nearly four hundred millions of dollars 
upon the army and navy. This money has been drawn from 
the laboring portion of our people; for, disguise it as we may, 



* Speech on the Bill to raise a Company of Sappers, Miners, and Pon- 
toniers. Delivered in Committee of the whole House on the state of the 
Union, May 12, 1846. 



178 THE MEXICAN WAR. 

every reflecting mind is aware that all our national burdens 
are indirectly borne by the productive class of our citizens. 
And, I ask, what benefit have they received in return for this 
vast expenditure ? Why, Sir, it has been wasted, thrown away ; 
nay, worse than thrown away. It has supported officers and 
soldiers in indolence, and very frequently in vice, rendering 
them incapable of discharging the obligations resting upon the 
citizens of a free government. The officers have been too 
much accustomed to command, and the soldiers too much 
habituated to obey. The former cannot well submit to the 
restraints of civil life, and the latter cannot be raised to the 
conscious dignity of free citizens. They have all become so 
accustomed to receive their support from the public treasury, 
that they are generally incapable of supporting themselves. 

The founders of our government evidently believed that we, 
as citizens, would possess the inherent power at all times of 
defending our nation. They had seen the patriotic devotion of 
our militia exhibited at Bunker Hill, at Saratoga, and on other 
battle-fields of the revolution, and felt the most perfect confi- 
dence that they would at all times be able and willing to repel 
all invasions from any power whatever. In this opinion, I 
most heartily concur. Our patriot fathers never dreamed that 
we should become intoxicated with the love of military life, 
and invade other nations for the purpose of conquest. They 
knew the fatal tendency of that policy. All history, both 
ancient and modern, showed them, as well as us, that the exten- 
sion of territory by military conquest had proven fatal to the 
conquerors ; and I now declare my unhesitating belief, that the 
war into which we are rushing with indecent haste, will, if 
continued as our settled policy, prove the grave of this 
republic. 

In the message of the President, sent to us yesterday, we 
were told that " American blood had been shed on American 
soil." In the documents accompanying that message, we were 
officially informed that the American soldiers who had first 
fallen upon the Rio Grande, had been shot by order of a non- 
commissioned officer, without arrest, without trial, without con- 






THE MEXICAN AVAR. 179 

viction or sentence. American soldiers, entitled to the protec- 
tion of our laws, whose lives were regarded as sacred as the 
lives of the members of this body, both by the laws of the land 
and by the rules and articles of war, by which the army itself 
should be governed, were murdered in cold blood by their 
brethren in arms. They are said to have attempted a deser- 
tion from the army ; but whether such were the facts or not, 
we have no legal proof. They were not permitted to show 
that they were absent from the army by permission of the 
proper officer. Had they been legally enlisted ? Were they 
of sufficient age in law to enter into a contract of enlistment ? 
Or were they minors ? Or had their enlistment been obtained 
by fraud ? Were they induced to drink to intoxication, and 
then, while laboring under the delirium of drunkenness, were 
they prevailed upon to enlist into the service of the United 
States ? Who will answer these questions ? Their mothers, 
their wives, their orphan children, may perhaps be informed ; 
but this House and the country are not. Sir, what compensa- 
tion is our nation to receive for the lives of its citizens ? Sup- 
pose we obtain the whole country between the Nueces and 
Del Norte, will it vindicate our violated laws ? Will it restore 
to life our murdered brethren ? Will it assuage the grief of 
those who now mourn their untimely deaths ? 

I refer to this murder of our citizens by our own army, as 
one of the horrors of a state of war, into which we are now pre- 
cipitating the nation. Yet the man who ordered, and those 
who perpetrated these murders, are guilty of one of the highest 
crimes known to civilized man. 

But, Mr. Chairman, I rose for the purpose of calling the 
attention of the House and of the country to another striking 
illustration of the danger of a standing army to the liberties of 
our people and the free institutions of our country. I allude, 
Sir, to the invasion of the Mexican territory, and the war into 
which we now find ourselves thus suddenly precipitated. Sir, 
I have not time to go into a minute examination of the pre- 
tended claims set up by Texas, and now advocated by our 
Executive, to the country between the Nueces and the Rio 



180 THE MEXICAN WAR. 

Grande. Every intelligent man is aware that so much of 
Mexico as lies east of this river, was divided into the States of 
" New Mexico," Chihuahua, Coahuila, and Tamaulipas ; that 
the Rio Grande, from its source to its mouth, was included 
within these departments ; and that the department of Texas, 
as originally established, was as distinct and as separate from 
New Mexico, Chihuahua, and Tamaulipas, as the State of New 
York is separate from Pennsylvania, New Jersey, or Ohio. It 
was, however, connected with Coahuila for legislative purposes 
until 1834, when the line which separated it from the latter 
State was established. Granting, for the sake of the argument, 
that Texas actually includes all that part of Coahuila lying" 
east of the Rio Grande, it would not give to her, nor to us, 
any claim whatever to that portion of Tamaulipas which has 
been invaded by our army. But, as I was saying, the line of 
separation between Texas and Coahuila was actually estab- 
lished by a commission duly appointed, and is as clearly laid 
down, and as definitely described, as the line which divides 
Maryland and Virginia. Commencing at the mouth of the 
Aransas, it follows up that stream to its source ; thence, in a 
direct line, to the confluence of the Medina and San Antonio, 
near Bexar; and, following up the Medina to its source, it 
runs thence westerly, until it intersects the east line of the 
State of Chihuahua. This line, thus established, was assented 
to by both Texas and Coahuila. They were the parties in 
interest, and their mutual compact must remain binding upon 
each, until, by mutual consent, it shall be abrogated. 

After the separation of Texas from Coahuila, each depart- 
ment enjoyed its privileges, appointed its officers, and was gov- 
erned by its own laws. As already remarked, New Mexico, 
Chihuahua, Coahuila, and Tamaulipas, each extended far to 
the east of the Rio Grande, and each had settlements east of 
that river. Santa Fe, the capital of New Mexico, and the 
residence of her governor, is situated some thirty miles east of 
the Rio Grande. 

Taos, another village, is still further east. At this place the 
custom-house is situated, at which our people, during the last 



THE MEXICAN WAR. 181 

year, paid more than a hundred thousand dollars in duties to 
the Mexican government on goods exported from Missouri. 
Many of our merchants are now there, protected by Mexican 
laws, and paying respect to Mexican authorities, while the 
President is sending us messages to make the people believe 
that those villages are within the United States, and that the 
people, their Governor, and all other Mexican officers, owe 
allegiance to our government. 

At Point Isabel, on the Gulf, is also a village, with its Mex- 
ican authorities and its custom-house, at which our own people 
have for many years paid duties under Mexican laws. I know 
of no other custom-houses on this side of the Rio Grande ; but 
there are villages east of that river, in each of the four depart- 
ments mentioned. From the first settlement of these villages 
and towns, down to the day on which General Taylor reached 
Point Isabel with his army, they were in the enjoyment of all 
their rights, under Mexican laws and customs, as loyal subjects 
of that government. Leaving the Mexican settlements on the 
" Rio Grande," (which is also called the " Rio del Norte," and 
the " Rio Bravo,") and travelling east, we enter a barren coun- 
try, a desert, at least one hundred miles in width, which is des- 
titute of settlements. As we approach the Nueces, we find the 
Spanish settlements which extend along that stream on both 
sides of it. These settlements are some forty miles west of the 
Aransas, which was established as the western line of Texas. 

The country, therefore, between the Aransas and the Nueces 
is clearly within the original boundary of Coahuila. But, being 
on the border of the two departments, it may perhaps be said 
to have been about as much under Texian as under Mexican 
laws. In truth, I suppose it can scarcely be said to have been 
under any law, during the war between Texas and Mexico. 
But, as I intend to assume no doubtful position, I will, for the 
sake of the argument, admit (contrary to the real fact) that 
Texas has extended her laws and jurisdiction to the Nueces, 
and, as it is said that some individuals on the west bank of that 
river have united with the Texans against the mass of people 
who adhere to Mexico, I will go as far as the distinguished 
16 



182 THE MEXICAN WAR. 

senator from Missouri (Mr. Benton) did, in 1844, and admit 
their jurisdiction to extend as far west as any individuals can 
be found who adhere to Texas. And we will suppose the Tex- 
ans actually to have conquered the country as far as the desert 
which divides the settlements on the Nueces from those on the 
Del Norte. West of this desert, no portion of the people have 
for a moment faltered in their loyalty to the Mexican Govern- 
ment. Texas has sent four several parties of armed men to 
conquer those settlements. One party only reached the Rio 
Grande ; but every man of it was killed or made captive, and, 
I believe, some of them are now in the mines of Mexico ; oth- 
ers have been released, and the rest are dead. One of the 
other parties was captured, and the other two were defeated, 
and fled back into Texas before they reached the vicinity of the 
Rio Grande. 

These facts, so prominent on the page of history, are passed 
(over by the President in his message, and, as a pretext for 
sending our army to invade and conquer the country upon the 
Rio Grande, he says : 

" Texas, by its act of December 19, 1836, had declared the Rio del Norte to be 
the boundary of that Republic." 

This mere declaration on paper by the Legislature of Texas 
could not change or alter the facts. They were entered upon 
the page of history, as well as upon the records of eternal truth ; 
and no flagrant falsehood by that body, indorsed by a dignitary 
of this government, can change or alter them. Texas had 
agreed upon the Nueces as her boundary. But, admitting that 
she had violated her solemn compact, and had conquered the 
country as far as the Nueces, or even to the Great Desert, she 
had never extended her boundary by compact or by conquest 
beyond that point. And, I repeat, that neither the unfounded 
assertion by the Legislature of Texas, that her boundary is the 
Del Norte, nor the repetition of that untruth by any man, how- 
ever dignified his office, can change or alter the fact, which 
must remain while the Author of Truth shall exist. 

"Were Mexico to declare, by a legislative act, that her eastern 
boundary is the " Hudson River," and, on paper, attach the 



THE MEXICAN WAR. 183 

whole of our States south and west of that stream to her con- 
gressional districts, and then, on paper, divide our seaboard into 
collection districts, without being able to enforce her laws in any 
way whatever, her President may, at the next meeting of her 
Congress, adopt this portion of President Polk's message, and 
urge, with equal propriety, that Pennsylvania and Ohio are 
Mexican territory. But, if Mexico possessed the power and. 
disposition to enforce such views, we should regard the carry- 
ing them out to be an outrage unparalleled among civilized and' 
Christian nations ; and were a Mexican army to invade our 
country, in order to compel us to unite with their government,, 
we should meet them sword in hand, and would only yield our ■ 
country with our lives. 

Yet, Sir, Mexico may claim the territory on which we now 
are, with as much propriety as we can claim the country on the 
Rio Grande. I have not time to make quotations from authors, 
but will rest my argument upon the facts given to the country 
by a distinguished statesman in the other end of this capitol, 
(Mr. Benton, of Missouri). He has probably examined the 
subject more thoroughly than any other member of either 
House of Congress. He is an ardent friend to the annexation 
of Texas, and a supporter of the President ; nor do I believe 
any member will deny or even doubt a single fact stated by 
him. I have already quoted him in regard to the boundary of 
Texas. He estimates the country east of the Rio Grande, 
which now is in the actual possession of Mexico, and which 
has ever been in its possession since it became a nation, at one 
hundred miles in width and two thousand in length, making 
two hundred thousand square miles, embracing a portion of 
New Mexico, Chihuahua, Coahuila, and Tamaulipas, with a 
population of thirty thousand. He informs us that " one-half.' 
of New Mexico, with its capital, ' Santa Fe/ containing a pop- 
ulation of four thousand, and Taos, with its custom-house, and' 
a population of three thousand, and Albuquerque, with its six 
thousand inhabitants, and some scores of other towns and vil- 
lages, all more or less populous, and surrounded by flocks and 
fields," are on this side of the Rio Grande, within the territory 



184 THE MEXICAN WAR. 

now said by the President to belong to the United States. 
Those people were born there under Mexican laws ; they have 
lived under that government, and are as much attached to it 
as we are to ours. 

Mr. Benton assures us that " no Texan force has ever been seen 
near it, without being killed or taken to the last man." They 
have defended their country as gallantly as our fathers defended 
ours. It is endeared to them by many interesting associations, 
and I predict they will not be easily subdued. Situated as 
Santa Fe is, nearly two thousand miles from the Gulf of Mex- 
ico, and nearly as far from any considerable settlement, either 
in Texas or the United States, which can furnish supplies to 
any invading army, I regard its conquest as no easy matter. I 
apprehend that much blood and much treasure will be ex- 
pended, before the people of New Mexico will be compelled to 
unite with slave-holding Texas. Those Mexicans love free- 
dom. They have abolished slavery, for which they entertain 
an unconquerable detestation. If I had time, I should like to 
inquire of gentlemen from New England and from our free 
States, what benefit our nation or the world are to receive from 
a conquest of that country, and the extension of slavery over it ? 
But I must beg the attention of the committee while I look 
a little farther into the reasons assigned by the President for 
ordering the army to the Rio Grande. He says, " The juris- 
diction of Texas had been extended and exercised beyond the 
Nueces" He, however, did not presume to assert that Texas 
had ever extended or exercised jurisdiction beyond the desert, 
which I have laid down as the farthest point to which her laws 
had ever been carried. Nor does he pretend that the jurisdic- 
tion of Texas was ever extended to the Mexican settlements " 
on the Eio del Norte, or within a hundred miles of those set- 
tlements. He most evidently intended the reader should under- 
stand the expression "beyond the Nueces," as synonymous 
with " to the Del Norte" This blood was shed more than a 
hundred miles west of the farthest point to which Texan laws 
had even been enforced. This attempted deception and fraud 
is unworthy of the President, or even of an honest man. 



THE MEXICAN WAR. 185 

Suppose Texas had, in fact, extended her jurisdiction be- 
yond the Nueces, even as far as the barren desert, does that 
give to her or to us a right to go a hundred miles further, to 
invade the Mexican territories, and compel the people of that 
region to submit to our laws, and to unite with Texas in viola- 
tion of the allegiance they owe to their own government ? Is 
such the logic of the Executive ? Is such shallow sophistry 
worthy of an American President ? But he goes on to say, 
" The country between that river (the Nueces) and the Rio del 
Norte had been represented in the Texan Congress, and in the 
Convention of Texas ; had thus taken part in the annexation 
itself, and is now included in one of our congressional dis- 
tricts." The legislature of Texas had on paper attached to one 
of her congressional districts lying east of the Nueces, the 
whole Mexican territory on the Rio del Norte, including the 
capital of New Mexico, and portions of the three other depart- 
ments heretofore named, together with thirty thousand native 
Mexicans, inhabiting some scores of towns and villages, spread 
over a country two thousand miles long, and one hundred 
broad. 

The people living on this side of the Nueces were Texans,, 
and they elected the representative, and he professed on paper- 
to represent the Mexicans between the desert and the Rio del 
Norte. But he did so without any authority from them; 
for I think no man will dare assert that any one of the thirty 
thousand Mexicans on this side of the Rio del Norte ever gave 
a vote for a representative in the Texan Congress, or for any 
other Texan officer; but, on the contrary, they had killed or 
taken every Texan who dared to show himself in that region.. 

But the President says this Mexican country ♦"is now in- 
cluded in one of our congressional districts." These thirty 
thousand people, who, so soon as the bill which passed this 
House yesterday shall receive the sanction of the Senate, and 
shall be approved by the President, will be in a state of war- 
with this nation, are to be represented on this floor because 
Texas has on paper attached them to one of her congressional 
districts. If this act of the Texan legislature has any binding 
16* 



186 THE MEXICAN WAR. 



force whatever, it will render every Mexican who opposes our 
army, a traitor against this government, and will subject him to 
the punishment of death. 

Yes, the men who burnt their dwellings at Point Isabel, and 
with their wives and little ones fled before our invading army, 
are to be represented in this body. The men who killed 
Colonel Cross and Lieutenant Porter and their comrades, are 
citizens of the United States, and to be represented in this 
hall ! Should their representative, according to the democratic 
doctrine, carry out the views of his constituents, the President 
himself may, in an unguarded moment, find a "lasso" about 
his own neck, and the members of our body be assassinated 
agreeably to the hearty wishes of the people of that district. 
But, to cap the climax of this paper claim, the President refers 
to the fact that an act of Congress passed during the present 
session, includes the country to the Rio del Norte, within one 
of our revenue districts. 

Gentlemen will remember that, one evening as we were 
about to adjourn, the bill referred to was called up and passed, 
without discussion or examination, and without being under- 
stood by the members. It was an expression on paper which, 
if we had been the actual occupants of the country, would have 
been binding upon the people, but which could have no effect 
whatever upon the people living upon the Del Norte under 
Mexican laws. 

Sir, a law of Congress designating the English coast as a 
revenue district, would have as binding an effect upon the Eng- 
lish people as the law in question has upon the Mexicans on 
the Rio Grande. There has long been a custom-house at Point 
Isabel ; and, notwithstanding our act of- Congress, we are told 
that our own people continued to pay duties to the Mexican 
government at that place, until the very day when General 
Taylor arrived there with his army, and the custom-house was 
burnt. The authorities at Santa Fe still continue to collect 
duties, and to pay them over to the Mexican government, as 
they have ever done since that government was established. 

Should we send an army there and conquer that people, and 



. 



THE MEXICAN WAR. 187 

take possession of the country, we should acquire the actual 
right to establish custom-houses and collect revenues ; but the 
argument that Texas, by her legislative acts on paper, could 
extend her conquests beyond the power of her armies, or that 
such acts of the Texan Congress, or of this Congress, could 
impose any obligation whatever upon the people of Mexico, 
or could give Texas or the United States any right of jurisdic- 
tion over them or their country, would be unworthy of serious 
refutation, had it not come from a high official source. Its 
sophistry is too transparent, and its absurdity too evident to 
obtain respect among an intelligent community. 

I regard it as having been put forth to divert public atten- 
tion from the outrage committed by the President upon our 
own Constitution, and the exercise of usurped powers, of which 
he has been guilty in ordering our army to invade a country 
with which we are at peace, and of provoking and bringing on 
this war. I am led to this inevitable conclusion from the fact 
that he dare not rest his justification upon truth. A mere 
glance at the message, notwithstanding the tissue of sophistry 
and misrepresentation thrown over the facts to which I have 
alluded, will show that he felt compelled to base the justifica- 
tion of his conduct on misrepresentation. He therefore reminds 
us of the grievous wrongs perpetrated (as he says) by Mexico 
upon our people in former years, and alludes to the delay of 
that government in the payment of debts due our people, and 
mourns over the loss of our commerce with Mexico ; all for 
the purpose of justifying himself in sending the army to the 
Rio Grande, and commencing the work of human butchery ! 

If the country be ours, why does he seek to justify the taking 
possession of it by reference to the fact that Mexico is in- 
debted to some of our people ? If it be not ours, and he has 
taken possession of it in order to compel Mexico to pay those 
debts, why not say so ? The fact that Mexico has not paid the 
debts due to our citizens, can have no legitimate connection 
with taking possession of our own soil. But the writer of the 
message was obviously conscious that this invasion of the Mex- 



188 THE MEXICAN WAR. 

ican territory could not be justified ; and he endeavored to 
extenuate the act by assuring us that " the movement of the 
troops to the Del Norte was made under positive instructions 
to abstain from all aggressive acts towards Mexico or Mexican 
citizens, unless she should declare war." 

"What aggressive acts towards a foreign power could our 
army commit while on our own territory? While the army 
was within the United States they could not commit violence 
upon Mexico. The order was also to abstain from all aggres- 
sive acts towards " Mexican citizens." It seems that the Presi- 
dent expected General Taylor to find Mexican citizens located 
within the United States. And this sentence evidently alludes 
to the order of the Secretary of War, bearing date July 20, 
1846, in which General Taylor was directed to take possession 
of the whole country " except that which was in the actual oc- 
cupation of Mexican troops or Mexican settlements." Here 
is a distinct admission that this country, claimed by the Presi- 
dent as a portion of the United States, was in the actual pos- 
session of Mexican troops and Mexican settlements. The idea 
that our army could peaceably surround those military posts 
occupied by Mexican troops, could be entertained by no reflect- 
ing mind. The President must have known, and we all know, 
that those military posts were established for the sole purpose of 
protecting the country, and the sending of our army there must 
have been done with the moral certainty that war would ensue. 
The truth is most obvious to the casual reader. The President 
obviously intended to involve us in war with Mexico. No 
sophistry can disguise that fact. That truth will stand on the 
page of history in all coming time, to the disgrace of this 
nation, and of the age in which we live. 

In order to show still further the inconsistency of the 
Executive, and expose the wickedness of this invasion of a 
country so long in the occupancy of Mexico, I will call the 
attention of the committee to the fact, that as early as the 15 th 
of June, General Taylor was directed to take a proper military 
position near the Rio Grande, for the avowed purpose of 



THE MEXICAN WAR. 189 

defending Texas. In answer to this order, on the 4th of 
October, General Taylor informed the department that he 
had encamped his army at Corpus Christi, and that — 

" Point Isabel would have fulfilled the conditions of this order better than 
any other position; " " but," he adds, " we had no artillery, no engineer force 
or appliances, and but a moderate amount of infantry; and the occupation of 
Point Isabel under these circumstances, with at least the possibility of resist- 
ance from the Mexicans, might have compromised the safety of my command." 

It should be borne in mind that at this time General Taylor 
had about four thousand regular troops under his command; 
yet he regarded it unsafe to attack Point Isabel with that force 
while destitute of artillery. Unsafe to take possession of our 
" own soil " — of this congressional district of Texas " — 
without artillery ? What contradiction in language ! What 
inconsistency in this Executive message ! In January, General 
Taylor was ordered peremptorily to advance with his army, 
and to take a position near the Rio Grande ; and the Secretary 
of War, speaking by order of the President, says : 

u From the views heretofore represented to this department, it is presumed 
Point Isabel will be considered by you an eligible position." 

Thus, in July the President directed General Taylor to respect 
the military posts in the actual possession of Mexican troops. 
In October, General Taylor informs him that it would be 
unsafe to attack Point Isabel without artillery ; and in January, 
the President orders him to take possession of it, knowing it 
to be a military post in the actual possession of the Mexican 
troops. 

Truth is at all times consistent with itself; but falsehood 
and fraud is opposed to fact ; opposed to the whole system of 
God's moral government ; opposed to itself. 

In order to arrive at the object in raising so large an 
army, we need only look to the documents furnished by the 
President. Apparently fearful that the orders communicated 
to General Taylor, directing him to respect such military posts 
as were in the possession of Mexican troops and the Mexican 
settlements, might not produce hostile collision between our 
army and the Mexicans, General Taylor was directed to regard 



190 THE MEXICAN WAR. 

the crossing of Mexican forces to this side of the Rio Grande, 
even to strengthen or reinforce those posts, " as the commence- 
ment of hostilities." The President seems to have believed it 
right for our army to take possession of the whole country 
around those posts, but for Mexico to increase the number of 
her troops in those places, was to be regarded as war. He 
was also frequently reminded of his powers to call for such 
number of troops as he should deem necessary ; and was 
authorized, in case of war, declared, or made manifest by hostile 
acts, to cross the Rio Grande at discretion, for the purpose of 
capturing or dispersing any Mexican army that might collect 
there, and "to take and hold Matamoras and other places in 
the country." 

Now, Mr. Chairman, the ulterior designs of the Executive 
are unfolded to us in this letter of instructions. The conquest 
of Mexico and California is the prize for which this game has 
been played. This object is more clearly manifested in the 
letter of instructions, bearing date on the 2d March, 1846, 
where General Taylor is told, — 

" If, in the course of events, you should have occasion to enter Mexico, it 
would be proper to quiet all apprehensions, so far as it can be done, by a public 
proclamation that the rights of property, persons, and religion, wall be respected. 
Particular care should be taken not to alarm the religious feelings of the 
Mexicans." 

It would be useless to multiply proofs on these points. The 
orders for General Taylor to march his army to the Del Norte ; 
to take a position opposite Matamoras ; to capture Point 
Isabel ; to regard the crossing of Mexican troops to this side 
of the Rio Grande as the commencement of hostilities; his 
authority, not to say orders, to cross his army to the south side 
of the Rio Grande, to take and hold Matamoras and other 
places in the country ; his directions to quiet the apprehensions 
of the people, and to conciliate them in order to render the 
conquest less difficult — all these directions develop the Exe- 
cutive designs so fully, that it would be a waste of time for me 
longer to occupy the attention of the committee to prove that 
conquest was the design of sending our army to the Rio Grande. 



THE MEXICAN WAR. 191 

It is equally evident, that the Mexicans viewed the advance 
of our army toward the Rio Grande as an invasion of their 
territory. The civil and military authorities of Mexico, in all 
their intercourse with General Taylor, characterized it "an 
invasion." The burning of the custom-house and other build- 
ings at Point Isabel, and the flight of the Mexicans before our 
advancing army; the cautious and warlike manner in which 
our army proceeded to that part of the country, and the con- 
stant military reconnoissances of the Mexicans, showed the 
light in which they viewed the transaction. 

This, then, is the character of the war now waged against a 
weak and distracted sister republic. It is a war of aggression 
and conquest. Its prosecution will be but an increase of our 
national guilt. The death of every victim who falls during its 
progress, will add to the already fearful responsibility of those 
who, from ambitious motives, have brought this curse upon our 
nation. Gentlemen who voted for the annexation of Texas 
should call to mind that they were solemnly warned of the 
amount of blood that would flow, the lives that would be 
sacrificed, by that outrage upon our Constitution, upon the 
rights of Mexico, and the rights of humanity. They were 
constantly told by those who opposed that measure, that war 
would result from it ; that Mexico would not submit to a dis- 
memberment of that portion of her territory which lies east of 
the Rio Grande. 

Sir, we then washed our hands of the guilt of annexation, 
and of its consequences. But we were then told of the vast pe- 
cuniary advantages it would bring to the northern States. When 
we spoke of the blood which would flow in this war, we were 
referred to the letter of Secretary Walker to prove that it was 
necessary for us to have Texas in order to protect our south- 
western frontier. Let those who then laughed at our predic- 
tions with such supercilious confidence, now stand forth and 
receive the proper odium due to their folly. 

But, Sir, I regard this war as but one scene in the drama 
now being enacted by this administration. Our government is 
undergoing a revolution no less marked than was that of 



192 THE MEXICAN WAR. 

France in 1792. As yet, it has not been characterized by 
that amount of bloodshed and cruelty which distinguished the 
change of government in France. When the Executive and 
Congress openly and avowedly took upon themselves the 
responsibility of extending and perpetuating slavery by the 
annexation of Texas, and by the total overthrow and subver- 
sion of the Constitution, and that, too, by the aid of northern 
votes, my confidence in the stability of our institutions was 
shaken, destroyed. I had hoped that the free States might be 
aroused in time to save our Union from final overthrow ; but 
that hope has been torn from me. 

It is true the several States may yet refuse to become 
parties to the new confederacy with Texas, formed for the sup- 
pression of the liberties of mankind and the support of slavery ; 
but I have very little expectation that any of them will refuse 
their assent to the outrage. Sir, those who come after us will 
look back upon the annexation of Texas, and will pronounce 
it the grave of our Constitution. It has now become an idle 
mockery for us to speak of constitutional rights. The great 
charter of our political liberties has been tamely surrendered 
by our free States to purchase perpetual slavery for the South. 
Our Union continues, but our Constitution is gone. The rights 
of the several States and of the people, now depend upon the 
arbitrary will of an irresponsible majority, who are themselves 
controlled by a weak but ambitious Executive. 

Am I asked for the evidence of this assertion ? I point you 
to the invasion of Mexico, by order of the Executive, while 
Congress was in session ; to the blockade of Matamoras ; to 
those acts which have involved us in all the evils of actual war, 
without even deigning to consult Congress on the subject. 
When all this was effected, the majority of this House placed 
at his disposal the whole military and naval force of the 
nation, with ten millions of treasure, for the conquest of 
Mexico, and then indorsed his flagrant misrepresentation by 
declaring, " war exists by the acts of Mexico." Thus has Con- 
gress surrendered its honor, its independence, and become the 
mere instrument of the Executive, and made to indorse this 



THE MEXICAN WAR. 193 

presidential falsehood. This invasion of a sister republic, this 
usurpation of imperial powers, this most despotic act of mak- 
ing war, has been sanctioned by this body ; and in a manner, 
too, which fully illustrates the disregard of constitutional 
restraints entertained by this House. 

Sir, on this great and momentous subject of peace and war, 
involving the lives of thousands of our fellow citizens and the 
welfare of two mighty nations, we were not permitted to 
speak, to deliberate, or to compare our views. No member 
was allowed to express his dissent, or state his objections to an 
act which is to tell upon the future destiny of civilized man. 
With indecent haste, with unbecoming levity, under the gag of 
the previous question, our nation is plunged into a bloody war 
for the purposes of conquest and the extension slavery.* 

This war, I apprehend, will prove no child's play. I enter- 
tain but little apprehension from pitched battles. Indeed, I 
doubt whether such a battle will ever be fought. It will be a 
kind of guerilla warfare. Our army will seldom see their 
enemies, who will hang around our camps, and destroy our 
men in detail, as opportunity shall offer. But the pestilence of 
the climate is to be our most deadly foe. Send your fifty 
thousand volunteers to the Rio Grande, and the deadly miasma 
will assail them, will waste their energies. The yellow fever 
and its concomitant diseases will do their work of death. Your 
troops will fall before an unseen power, and their bones will 
whiten upon those distant prairies, and the heart of many a 
wife, and many an orphan, will bleed ere Mexico will submit to 
our arms. 

Sir, no man regards this war as just. We knoio, the coun- 
try knows, and the civilized world are conscious, that it has 
resulted from a desire to extend and sustain an institution on 
which the curse of the Almighty most visibly rests. Mexico 
has long since abolished slavery. She has purified herself 
from its crimes and its guilt. Like the semi-barbarians of 



* The declaration of war had been forced through the House of Representa- 
tives under the previous question on the day before this speech was delivered. 
17 



194 THE MEXICAN WAR. 

Egypt and Tunis, they have separated themselves from its foul 
contagion. That institution is now circumscribed on the south- 
west by Mexico, where the slaves of Texas find an asylum. 
A gentleman from Matamoras lately assured me that there 
were in and about that city at least five hundred fugitives from 
Texan bondage. Experience has shown that they cannot be 
held in servitude in the vicinity of a free government. It has 
therefore become necessary to extend our dominions into 
Mexico in order to render slavery secure in Texas. Without 
this, the great objects of annexation will not be attained. We 
sought to extend and perpetuate slavery in a peaceful manner 
by the annexation of Texas. Now we are about to effect 
that object by war and conquest. Can we invoke the blessing 
of Deity to rest on such motives? Has the Almighty any 
attribute that will permit Him to take sides with us in this 
(Contest? 

There are also pecuniary considerations addressing them- 
selves to the people of this nation. It is said that the annexa- 
tion of Texas has already cost us ten millions of dollars, 
although we have no official data by which to ascertain the 
precise amount. The ten millions appropriated by the bill of 
yesterday, will do little more than to man, equip, and set our 
navy afloat, and bring our army into the field. An additional 
ten millions will probably be required by the first of January 
next. How long the war will continue, is beyond our knowl- 
edge. But should it continue five years, hundreds of millions 
will be swallowed up.* These untold sums will be drawn from 
the people. And what are they to receive in return ? Why, 
Sir, the parasites of the Executive will make splendid for- 
tunes. Thousands of offices will be created, and filled by as 
many fawning sycophants, who will fatten upon the lifeblood of 
the nation. The virtue of our better days will yield and 
gradually disappear, before the flood of vice and immorality 
now ready to rush in upon us. 

* The whole expense of the war has, since its close, been variously esti- 
mated from one to two hundred millions dollars. 



THE MEXICAN WAR. 195 

I know it is said that a large army and heavy appropriations 
will make a short war. God grant that the prediction may 
prove true. I apprehend that Mexico has maturely considered 
the subject, and enters upon the war with a solemn conviction 
that her existence as a nation depends upon her resistance to 
our aggressions. The correspondence before us proves the 
fact. The devotion of her people at Point Isabel conclusively 
shows it. Why, Sir, look at General Taylor's report, and you 
will see a devotion manifested by the officers and peasantry of 
Mexico, that speaks in thunder tones to those who regard the 
conquest of that people as a trifling matter. See the females 
and children, at the approach of our troops, leave their homes,, 
consecrated by all the ties of domestic life, and while they are 
fleeing to the Mexican army for protection, see their husbands 
and fathers apply the torch to their own dwellings, and then fly 
to arms in defence of their institutions. I confess I was struck 
with deep solemnity when that communication was read at 
your table ; and, in imitation of William Pitt, I was ready to 
swear that, if I were a Mexican, as I am an American, I 
would never sheathe my sword while an enemy remained upon 
my native soil. 

What force will be necessary to conquer such a people? 
Let all history give the answer. How long did it require 
Bonaparte, with his half million of disciplined troops, to con- 
quer the rude and half civilized people of Russia? How long 
did it require our army to subdue a few hundred miserable 
Seminoles in our immediate vicinity ? 

With these considerations resting upon my mind, I was on 
yesterday called to vote for a declaration of war against Mex- 
ico ; or, rather, as introductory to such declaration of war, I 
was asked to declare to the world that "Mexico had made war 
upon us." That assertion I knew would be untrue, as I have 
already shown. I felt most deeply the impotence of this body, 
in thus attempting to change or alter great and important facts 
already entered upon the records of eternal truth, where they 
will remain while a God of truth shall exist. Sir, when we 
were about to assume upon ourselves the awful responsibility 



196 THE MEXICAN WAR. 

of involving our country in a serious and bloody war, with all 
its consequences ; when about to appeal to a God of justice 
and of truth for his aid in maintaining our national rights, I 
dared not do so with an impious falsehood upon my lips. 

Had this been the only objection to the bill, I should have 
regarded it as fatal. But, Sir, I saw no necessity for a declara- 
tion of war. Let our army be now withdrawn within our own 
territory, and not a member of this House would entertain 
either fears or expectations of further hostilities. No intelli- 
gent man would hazard his reputation by arguing that Mexico 
would invade us. General Taylor informs us that no danger 
whatever was to be apprehended while our army remained at 
Corpus Christi. I would have voted for any amount of men 
and money that might have been regarded as necessary, to 
withdraw our army from the Mexican territory. 

I know the insidious efforts put forth, representing those 
who opposed this declaration of war as opposing supplies and 
aid to our army, who are now surrounded by Mexicans. I 
think gentlemen who make these efforts, have underrated the 
intelligence of the people. Neither General Taylor nor the 
army have incurred any responsibility by obeying the orders 
of the President. They were not permitted to judge of the 
propriety of those orders. They should, therefore, be relieved 
and brought back to our soil. But for me to vote for a con- 
tinuance of hostilities, by declaring war, would be to carry into 
effect the very objects for which our army was ordered into 
Mexican territory. I will give no vote to continue that inva- 
sion, or to declare an unjust war, because the President has 
provoked hostilities. I would gladly vote to withdraw our 
troops from Mexican soil, and to disavow the invasion which 
has been made without authority. As I have already said, I 
would appropriate any amount of money, or any military force 
necessary to bring back our troops in safety. Then, Sir, hav- 
ing placed ourselves in the right, we should find but one heart 
and one mind among us, and that would be in favor of defend- 
ing our rights and our country. 

But I hear it said that " we must go for our country, right 



THE B1EXICAN WAR. 197 

or wrong." If this maxim be understood to require us to go 
with our country, or with the majority of our country, to com- 
mit a wrong upon other nations or people, either in time of 
peace or in time of war, I deny its morality ; but, if it be 
understood as imposing upon us, at all times and under all cir- 
cumstances, the obligation of using all our influence and efforts to 
set our country in the right when we find her wrong, or to keep 
her right when we find her in the path of duty, then, Sir, I 
yield my assent to its correctness. "We are not to abandon our 
country because our government is badly administered ; but, in 
such case, we should use our efforts to correct the evil, and 
place the government in just and able hands. 

Again, it is said, " we must stand by our country." The man 
who would do otherwise, would be unworthy of any country. 
He only is a true friend of his country who maintains her vir- 
tue and her justice ; and he is not a true friend to his country, 
who will knowingly support her in doing wrong. To-morrow, 
this nation will probably be in a state of war with Mexico. It 
will be an aggressive, unholy, and unjust war. It will then be 
my duty to use my efforts to restore peace at the earliest prac- 
ticable moment that it can be done on just and honorable prin- 
ciples. But, while the war continues, efforts will probably be 
made to conquer Mexico, and we shall be called on to appro- 
priate money and raise troops to go there and slay her people, 
and rob her of territory. But the crime of murdering her 
inhabitants, and of taking possession of her territory, will be as 
great to-morrow, after war shall have been declared, as it would 
have been yesterday. 

Justice is as unchangeable as its Author. The line of moral 
rectitude will never bend to our selfish passions. In the mur- 
der of Mexicans upon their own soil, or in robbing them of 
their country, I can take no part, either now or hereafter. The 
guilt of these crimes must rest on others ; I will not participate 
in them; but if Mexicans or any other people should dare 
invade our country, I would meet them with the sword in one 
hand, and a torch in the other; and, if compelled to retreat, 
like the Mexicans at Point Isabel, I would lay our dwellings 
17* 



198 THE MEXICAN WAR. 

in ashes, rather than see them occupied by a conquering 
army. 

We may always justify ourselves for defending our country, 
but never for waging a war upon an unoffending people for the 
purpose of conquest. There is an immutable, an eternal prin- 
ciple of justice pervading the moral universe. No nation, or 
people, or individual, ever did or ever will violate that law with 
impunity. Bonaparte suffered its penalty. After the conquest 
of kingdoms, and subjecting a large portion of Europe by his 
victorious arms, he was driven an exile from his people and 
country, and died upon a desolate and barren island. His peo- 
ple having sacrificed untold millions of money and hundreds of 
thousands of lives to annex other governments to France, as we 
are now endeavoring to annex Texas and a part of Mexico, 
suddenly found themselves under the power of the allied army, 
their annexed governments again independent, and themselves 
doomed to pay the whole expense of a long and bloody war. 
They had violated this law of right, and they suffered its pen- 
alty ; nor can it be otherwise, while a God of justice controls 
the destinies of nations. 

But we have a more recent example within our own experi- 
ence. Some two or three years since, while our nation was in 
the enjoyment of peace and prosperity, our Executive, in order 
to render the institution of slavery more permanent, thereby 
insuring the oppression and degradation of a greater number of 
the human family, commenced negotiations for the annexation 
of Texas. The object was most iniquitous, but, by the aid of 
Congress, it has been effected, and the law of eternal justice 
violated ; and now the penalty is inevitable. Sir, how much 
money and how many lives have already been sacrificed in this 
attempt to fasten the chains of servitude upon our fellow men ? 

And now, suppose we send an army into Mexico, and kill 
hundreds and thousands of her people, burn her cities, and lay 
waste her country; do you think we shall escape the dread 
penalty of retributive justice ? I tell you, we shall not. As 
sure as our destiny is swayed by a righteous God, our troops 



THE MEXICAN WAR. 199 

will fall by the sword and by pestilence ; our widows will 
mourn ; and our orphans, rendered such by this unholy war, 
will be thrown upon our public charity. Vice will increase, 
and patriotism will be depreciated.* 

But it is said that the people are in favor of war. I deny the 
assertion. When the annexation of Texas was agitated, during 
the campaign of 1844, it was urged that it would involve us in 
a war, precisely as it has done. I know that, to the extent of 
my observation, such a war, for the support of slavery, was 
regarded with horror by all parties ; and, to avoid the effect 
which this argument was designed to have upon the public 
mind, the friends of annexation, in this House and before the 
people, denied that war would result from it. The war has 
resulted ; and I am unable to discover why it should be more 
popular now, than it was then. Had the friends of Mr. Polk 
then admitted that war would ensue from the annexation of 
Texas, he would not probably have received an electoral vote 
north of Mason and Dixon's line. Has the deception practised 
upon the people, and the falsehoods by which they have been 
cajoled into this war, rendered it popular ? 

But again ; it is said that war is always popular. I deny 
this assertion, also. I believe that nine tenths of our people 
regarded the Florida war with contempt. Their disgust arose 
from the fact, that it was unjust and cruel, and arose from an 
effort to sustain slavery. This war is equally unjust, and arises 
from the same cause, and must be viewed in the same light by 
the people. It is impossible, in the nature of things, for it to 
be otherwise. Our people feel no hostility to those of Mexico. 
The Mexicans have remained at home, " under their own vines 
and fig-trees ; " they have not molested us or'encroached upon 
our rights. It is true that their population is less intelligent 
than that of our free States ; and it is equally true, that they 
are more rapidly improving their condition than are those of 

* Our ablest writers estimate the number of victims who fell in this war, by- 
pestilence and the sword, at eighty thousand. Of these, thirty thousand were 
said to be Americans, and fifty thousand Mexicans. 



200 THE MEXICAN WAR. 

our slave States. They are surely in advance of them in the 
diffusion of universal liberty among their people. The means 
of intelligence and enjoyment are open to all. 

Indeed, taking the whole population of our slave States and 
of Mexico into consideration, I think we shall find the Mexi- 
cans the best informed, most intelligent, and most virtuous. 
Our people of the North have sympathized with them in their 
efforts to render their free government permanent and respect- 
able. Can the lovers of liberty now desire to see a sister 
Republic wantonly subverted, while just coming into existence, 
and struggling for the permanent establishment of civil free- 
dom ? It cannot be. You may declare war ; display your 
banners, your glittering arms, your blazing uniforms ; you may 
raise the battle-cry, and sound your trumpets ; but you cannot 
induce the intelligent men of the North to march to Mexico for 
the purpose of bathing their hands in Mexican blood for the 
extension of slavery. You may for the moment excite the 
young, the giddy, and thoughtless ; but their " sober, second 
thoughts," will lead them to inquire for the cause of the war in 
which they are asked to engage. The true answer to that 
inquiry must overwhelm its authors with disgrace. 

There is, however, one cheering circumstance in the distant 
future. All history informs us that for ages, no nation or peo- 
ple, once having adopted the system of universal freedom, was 
ever afterwards brought to the maintenance of slavery. There 
are now probably eight or nine millions of people in Mexico, 
who hate slavery as sincerely as do those of our free States. 
You may murder or drive from their country that whole popu- 
lation, but you can never force slavery upon them. Now I 
say to those gentlemen, who are so zealous for this conquest, 
that our slave States will be the last to consent to the annexa- 
tion of free States to this Union. I know that Southern men 
are now, and have been, zealous in bringing on this war and 
for extending our territory ; but they will, at no distant day, 
view the subject in its true light, and will change their position, 
and will oppose the extension of our territory in any direction, 



THE MEXICAN WAR. 201 

unless slavery be also extended.* They desired to annex 
Texas, and to extend her bounds as far as possible, because she 
is a slave-holding country; but the increase of free States, 
either at the North or at the South, will be strenuously op- 
posed by the advocates of slavery. 

This war is waged against an unoffending people, without 
just or adequate cause, for the purposes of conquest ; with the 
design to extend slavery; in violation of the Constitution, 
against the dictates of justice, of humanity, the sentiments of 
the age in which we live, and the precepts of the religion 
we profess. I will lend it no aid, no support whatever. I will 
not bathe my hands in the blood of the people of Mexico, nor 
will I participate in the guilt of those murders which have 
been, and which will hereafter be committed by our army 
there. For these reasons I shall vote against the bill under 
consideration, and all others calculated to support this war. 



* Mr. Calhoun refused to vote for the declaration of war, -which passed the 
Senate the very clay on which this speech was delivered. 



THE WILMOT PROVISO.* 



ITS ADOPTION ADVOCATED— THREATS OF SOUTHERN MEMBERS — NORTH- 
ERN MEN MUST TAKE POSITION — OBJECTS OF CIVIL GOVERNMENT — OUR 
PAST POLICY. 

[The advocates of the Mexican war were anxious to bring it to a close. For 
that purpose they desired to place a large fund at the disposal of the Execu- 
tive, to be used as he should think proper. To this, the friends of liberty were 
willing to accede, provided slavery should be excluded from any territory 
which might be obtained from Mexico. A proposition was made to amend the 
bill in that way. On this motion, Mr. Giddings delivered the following speech.] 

Mr. Speaker, — The proposition now before us is one of 
that plain and distinct character, which enables every member 
to comprehend it at the first view. We are engaged in a war 
with Mexico. It is most obviously a war of conquest, intended 
by the Executive to obtain further territory, over which to 
extend the curse of slavery ; and the proposition before us is 
to make such territory free, by attaching to it what is called 
the " Wilmot Proviso." 

Every person who has heard, or read the debates of this 
body, during its present session, must be convinced that ques- 
tions of no ordinary magnitude are pending before us. The 
fierce conflict of opinion, the criminations and recriminations, 
the stern defiance, the solemn appeals, the impassioned elo- 
quence, show conclusively that we are approaching a crisis of 
deep and pervading interest. Indeed, we must soon decide, 

* Speech upon the motion to attach the Wilmot Proviso to the Bill granting 
three millions of dollars, to be used by the Executive for terminating the Mex- 
ican war. Delivered in Committee of the whole House, on the state of the 
"Union, February 13, 1847. 



THE WILMOT PROVISO. 203 

so far as this present House of Representatives can determine, 
whether or not the blood and treasure of this nation shall be 
poured out on Mexican soil, for the purpose of establishing 
slavery upon territory hitherto consecrated to freedom. The 
advocates of oppression from the North, and from the South, 
will arrange themselves in the affirmative, and the friends of 
freedom will be found in the negative. A few yet remain ap- 
parently undecided. The seductions of Executive favor are 
held out to entice them to enlist under the black flag of sla- 
very ; while the still, small voice of reason and of conscience 
is beckoning them to the ranks of freedom. 

Gentlemen from the South, with deep emotions, have 
solemnly warned us, that if we persist in our determination, 
the " Union will he dissolved." I do not doubt their sincerity. 
But I would rather see this Union rent into a thousand frag- 
ments than have my country disgraced, and its moral purity 
sacrificed, by the prosecution of a war for the extension of 
human bondage. Nor would I avoid this issue, were it in my 
power. For many years have I seen the rights of the North, 
and the vital principles of our Constitution, surrendered to 
the haughty vaporings of southern members. For many 
years have I exerted my humble influence to stimulate northern 
members to the maintenance of our honor and of the Constitu- 
tion. And now I devoutly thank that God, who has permitted 
me to witness the union of a portion of northern members of 
both political parties, upon a question so vital to our interests 
and honor, as well as to humanity. 

I also rejoice that this is a question which admits of no 
compromise. Slavery and freedom are antagonisms. They 
must necessarily be at war with each other. There can be no 
compromise between right and wrong, or between virtue and 
crime. The conflicting interests of slave and free labor have 
agitated this government from its foundation, and will continue 
to agitate it, until truth and justice shall triumph over error 
and oppression. Should the proposition now before us fail, it 
will surely succeed at the next session of Congress ; for it is 
very evident that public sentiment in the free States is daily 



204 THE WILMOT PROVISO. 

becoming more and more in favor of it. The legislatures in 
six of those States have instructed their Senators and requested 
their Representatives to vote for this measure. Few gentle- 
men on this floor will disregard those resolutions when we come 
to the vote. Whigs and democrats will then be found acting 
together. Our party attachments will be disregarded, and the 
interests of the nation will receive our attention. 

Sir, for the first time in my life, I see northern whigs and 
northern democrats standing shoulder to shoulder in the cause of 
human rights. Would to God that such might be the case on 
all questions touching the interests, the honor, and the rights 
of the free States, and of mankind ! There is no good reason 
why northern Representatives should waste their political power 
by party divisions among themselves. Let them act irrespective 
of southern influence, and they will agree upon all the great 
questions so vitally interesting to our people. It is time that we 
should discard those counsels which have led to the sacrifice of 
nearly all our political interests. Before God and my country, I 
solemnly pledge myself never to place political confidence in 
any man who lacks the honesty or the firmness to speak and 
act in favor of freedom and the Constitution. 

The objects and ulterior designs of this war have lately 
been so fully avowed, and are now so generally understood, 
that it would be a work of supererogation to repeat them. 

All, I believe, are aware, and admit, that the extension of 
slavery over territory now free, and under the jurisdiction of 
Mexican laws, constitutes the object for which such a vast ex- 
penditure of blood and treasure is to be made ; and I repeat, 
that each member who is in favor of that object will, of course, 
vote against the amendment which will prohibit slavery within 
such territory as we may acquire, if any ; and those in favor 
of the "self-evident truths" put forth by our fathers in 1776, 
will vote for the amendment offered. The war in which we 
are engaged has precipitated this issue upon us ; and I rejoice 
, that it is thus presented for our decision. I hope and trust, 
our determination may be such as to meet the approval of our 
consciences, and of our God. This acquisition of slave terri- 



THE W1LM0T PROVISO. 205 

tory, is substantially the same question which was propounded 
to us when we were called to annex Texas to these States. 
The subject is more generally understood, and better appre- 
ciated at this time than it was then. 

You, Mr. Chairman, well recollect that the evening on which 
the resolutions for annexing Texas passed this body, "the 
loud-mouthed cannon," from the terrace in front of the Capitol, 
announced to the friends of that measure its final success. I 
was pensively wending my way to my lodgings, when my ears 
were saluted by the roar of those guns, which I then regarded 
as "minute guns," announcing the final overthrow of the 
Union which had been formed by our patriot fathers. I clearly' 
saw, or thought I saw, my country involved in a system of 
territorial aggrandizement; involved in aggressive war; ex- 
pending the blood and treasure of the nation, for the extension 
of an institution odious to man, and forbidden by the laws of 
God. As I then looked forward to the circumstances which 
now surround us, I was greatly depressed with their con- 
templation. 

Sir, long before this war commenced, I declared, in this 
h all, that " I would rather see a war with Great Britain, with 
all its horrors, and its devastation of public morals, than to see 
the people of the free States quietly submit to the annexation 
of Texas." I then deeply felt what I said. I felt that our 
Constitution had ceased to limit the powers of either Congress 
or the Executive ; I saw the union of 1787 broken up and 
abandoned, for the purpose of bringing into our political asso- 
ciation a foreign slave-holding government ; I saw that foreign- 
ers, as destitute of constitutional qualifications as any other 
foreigners, were to be placed in this hall, to strike down the 
interests and to control the rights of my constituents, and of 
the free States ; I saw this war in prospect, with its crimes and 
guilt ; I saw the national debt that has been, and is to be, 
incurred, the disgrace that is to rest upon our nation, the strife 
and contention in which we are now engaged among ourselves ; 
and I clearly saw that this career of conquest, if persisted in, 
must prove the grave of our republic. And I repeat, that 
18 



206 THE WILMOT PROVISO. 

unless the friends of the Constitution and of humanity can 
now stop this policy of acquiring territory, the end of this 
government draws near. 

During our present session, I have received petitions from 
various States of this Union, numerously signed, praying that 
our political association with Texas may be dissolved. The 
petitioners base their requests upon the fact, that the people of 
the free States have never authorized Congress to place their 
rights or interests at the disposal of foreigners. They feel 
that they have been transferred, like southern slaves, to an asso- 
ciation with Texians ; not by the votes of their own Represent- 
atives, but by the votes of members from the slave States, who 
felt that it would be for the benefit of slavery that the freemen 
of the North should be controlled by southern votes. Believe 
you that this feeling is to die away while this war, designed 
still further to degrade the North, shall be continued ? Will 
our people become satisfied while northern freemen are called 
upon to go to Mexico, and sacrifice their lives that the slave 
power may be increased, and the North still further disgraced ? 
I assure you, Sir, that our people are becoming aroused to the 
dangers which threaten them ; and although men of high 
character and of commanding talents may deem it bad policy to 
speak forth unwelcome truths, jet, Sir, there are instrumental- 
ities at work which will inform the public mind of the true 
political condition of the free States ; and when the people of 
those States shall understand fully the manner in which their 
interests have been silently surrendered, and their constitutional 
rights subverted, they will take care to place more faithful 
sentinels upon the watchtowers of liberty. 

But, Sir, we have been told here, that " the whig party are 
in favor of prosecuting this war." Sir, I know not on what 
authority gentlemen make this assertion. I deny that Repre- 
sentatives from Pennsylvania are authorized to express on this 
floor the wishes of the whig party of Ohio ; or that gentlemen 
from Philadelphia have authority to declare the views of my 
constituents. The congressional district which I' have the 
honor to represent, gives the largest whig majority of any in 



THE WILMOT PROVISO. 207 

the United States. And I have longer represented my con- 
stituents consecutively than any other whig member of this 
body, except my venerable friend from Massachusetts, (Mr. 
Adams). I shall, therefore, speak for them as I was com- 
missioned to do. Nor shall I silently allow any other gentle- 
man to represent them as so ignorant of their moral and 
political duties, or so lost to a just sense of their obligations to 
mankind, and to God, as to be willing to lend any assistance 
in that work of human butchery now going on in Mexico. 

Why, Sir, when the brigade in which the commercial city of 
Cleveland is situated, was Called on for volunteers to aid this 
war, only about thirty human beings could be found sunk so 
low in the depths of moral depravity as to be willing to join 
in cutting the throats of their fellow men in Mexico. Another 
brigade in my district, after searching all the haunts of vice 
and dissipation, was able to furnish only three volunteers for 
this war. It should be borne in mind that not one of the 
whole number was a whig. When the other brigade was 
called on, they replied with one voice — " We will fight for 
liberty, but not for slavery ; " and to their honor be it said, not 
a man of either political j)arty would lend his influence to the 
prosecution of this nefarious war. Sir, let gentlemen speak for 
themselves, or for their own districts ; but let no man presume 
to slander my people by representing them as favorable to the 
prosecution of our conquests in Mexico. 

They, Sir, understand what it is to defend their country. 
They have had too much experience on that subject, to be 
deceived by the cry that is now raised, for the purpose of 
obtaining recruits to go to Mexico. When, in 1812, British 
prowess had captured our army under General Hull, and 
hordes of Indians were hanging upon our frontiers ; when the 
cabins of our pioneers were lighted up by the savage torch ;. 
when our women and children were murdered, and the toma- 
hawk and scalping-knife were doing their work of destruction, 
the fathers of our present soldiery hastened to the field of 
honor and of danger. They encountered privations and hard- 
ships. Windy speeches, and such overflowing gasconade as we 



208 THE WILMOT PROVISO. 

have listened to in this hall, would not answer the purpose of 
that day. With unflinching hearts and steady nerves, they 
met the savage foe ; they witnessed the horrid scenes of blood 
and strife in defence of their country. Sir, go talk to them 
now of their duty to volunteer, to encounter such scenes again, 
in order to extend slavery, and they will regard it as a direct 
insult to their intelligence as well as to their patriotism. Their 
motto is, " no more slave territory." It is the motto of both 
political parties there ; and, I trust, this sentiment will be 
maintained here. The resolutions lately passed by the almost 
unanimous voice of the Legislatures of six sovereign States, 
including the three most powerful of the Union, would seem to 
indicate a determination to adhere to this maxim. 

It is now quite evident that this war will prostrate the pres- 
ent administration, and all who continue to lend their influence 
to support it. When we next assemble here, the whigs will 
probably constitute a majority of this body. Will they, by 
their votes, increase our national debt, by continuing our con- 
quests in Mexico ? Will they send more of our fellow-citizens 
there to be sacrificed to this Moloch of slavery ? If so, they, 
too, will suffer the penalty due to such crimes, and in turn will 
be driven from power.* 

But, while the North possess the power to exclude farther 
slave territory, our danger consists in our own party divisions, 
and in the far-reaching policy of southern statesmen. But two 
days since, a distinguished senator in the other end of the cap- 
itol (Mr. Calhoun) brought forward a proposition the most 
dangerous to northern rights that could be devised under exist- 
ing circumstances. Foreseeing, as all reflecting men do, that 
the army must be withdrawn, if the opponents of the war 
remain firm to their purpose, he proposes to compromise the 
matter, by bringing back the troops to the Rio Grande ; to 
occupy that river from its mouth to the " Passo del Norte," 
and from thence, to erect a line of fortifications due west to the 

* The democrats were defeated the following year. The whigs took up the 
war, and carried it on, and were again driven from power, precisely according 
to this prophecy. 



THE WILMOT PROVISO. 209 

Gulf of California ; holding possession of the whole Mexican 
territory on this side of the line thus indicated, until peace shall 
be restored. 

It should be borne in mind, that the Mexican government 
and the officers of their army are pledged against all attempts 
at negotiating a peace with us, while our army occupies any 
portion of their territory. If, therefore, this plan be adopted, 
we shall be at the expense of holding military occupation of the 
country for an indefinite period. The Mexicans will not sub- 
mit to a despotism wielded by our military officers, and, there- 
fore, will leave the country ; and slave-holders, with their 
human chattels, will occupy their places. Our army will act 
as a guard to keep the slaves in subjection, while their pro- 
fessed object will be to defend the country against the Mexi- 
cans. In this way, a sparse slave-holding population will be 
scattered over it, and, perhaps at some future time, Mexico, 
exhausted and disheartened, may consent to cede it to us. If 
so, there being so many slaves already there, will be urged 
upon us as a conclusive reason why slavery shall continue 
throughout that vast extent of country. If, on the other hand, 
a peace shall be concluded, without obtaining a title to the 
country, then a revolution, after the example of Texas, will', 
take place, and annexation to this Union, with a vast increase 
of the slave power in the councils of the nation, will be the 
result ; for it should be borne in mind, that the territory thus 
proposed to be occupied by us, is of sufficient extent to be divi- 
ded into fourteen such States as Ohio. 

Some northern men appear to regard this proposal with a 
degree of favor which alarms me. In truth, Mr. Chairman, 
we have been so long accustomed to surrender our rights to the 
demands of the South, that some of our friends appear to think 
it improper for us to take a firm position in support of the 
honor and the interests of our free States. They seem willing 
to surrender a portion of our rights to appease slave-holding 
rapacity. Sir, this policy has already brought us to the verge 
of political ruin ; continue it a little longer, and the people of 
the free States will themselves be slaves. Let the proposition, 
18* 



210 THE WILMOT PROVISO. 

alluded to be adopted, and the power of the free States will 
dwindle to insignificance in the other branch of the Legislature. 
We shall then be regarded as useful to the Union, only as 
instruments to support slavery. Northern rights and northern 
honor will be looked upon as among the things that were ; they 
will be unknown to the future. I would most solemnly caution 
every man against consenting to this proposed policy. Its 
effect will be to extend the boundaries of Texas to the Rio 
Grande. That was stated by the distinguished Senator to 
whom I have alluded, to be one of the great objects of the war. 
That plan, once adopted, must prove fatal to the free States. 
I repeat, let us stand immovably upon the maxim of having 
" no more slave territory," " no more slave States." Let this 
be our watchword here and in our State Legislatures, and 
among the entire people of the free States, including all politi- 
cal parties, and, I assure you, we shall have peace at no dis- 
tant day.* 

Again, some northern men who are opposed to extending 
slavery, appear willing to obtain further territory, under the 
impression that it will remain free. I greatly fear, Sir, if we 
add to the extent of our south-western border, it will prove an 
extension of slavery. I am, therefore, opposed to obtaining 
any more territory in that direction. I would confine Texas to 
the precise limits occupied by her at the time of annexation. 
Beyond that, I would not extend the power of the slave-holder 
to recapture his slave. I would leave the whole country 
beyond the valley of the Nueces free. Let it be a place of 
refuge, unpolluted by the footsteps of the slave-catcher, where 
the panting fugitive may rest in safety ; where no Texian mas- 
ter shall have power to seize or re-enslave him, as he may now 
do in our free States. 

I desire to call attention to the immense sacrifice of human 
life now making to carry on this war. The official documents 

* Mr. Benton, in his history, informs us that so vigorous was the opposition to 
this war, at one time, that the President directed the recall of the army; and 
an order was actually made out and signed for that purpose ; but the President 
was induced to reconsider his proposition, and the order was withheld. 






THE WILMOT PROVISO. 211 

before us show that twenty-three thousand nine hundred and 
ninety-eight officers and men entered the service during the first 
eight months of this war ; that fifteen thousand four hundred 
and eighty-six remained in service at the close of that time ; 
that three hundred and thirty-one had deserted ; and that two 
thousand two hundred and two had been discharged ; leaving 
five thousand nine hundred and nineteen unaccounted for. 
Thus, in little more than eight months, this war has cost the 
lives of nearly six thousand American troops, or about one 
third of the whole number sent to Mexico. A distinguished 
senator (Mr. Calhoun) estimates our loss at one third of those 
who go to that country. I presume the Mexican loss to be 
about one third as great as ours,* and the whole number of 
human beings sacrificed in this attempt to extend slavery, is 
now about one thousand per month. Sir, what should be the 
reflections of those gentlemen who have contributed their votes 
and their influence to send their neighbors and friends in such 
numbers to Mexican graves ? I regard every regiment that 
marches for that country as a funeral procession, one third of 
whom are going to their resting-place in that vast charnel- 
house beyond the Rio Grande, and another third to return with 
shattered constitutions, doomed to early graves. How long will 
the free States continue to furnish victims for this sacrifice ? 

But I return to the question more particularly under con- 
sideration. It has been seriously argued that we have no 
power to prohibit slavery from such territory as we may 
acquire. Our feelings, Mr. Chairman, often draw us into argu- 
ments of the most extraordinary character. The question has 
been asked with an air of triumph, "Where does Congress 
find authority to prohibit slavery in our territories?" I 
answer, we find it in the common powers of legislation ; in the 
power to prevent assault and battery, outrage, and crime. The 
law that prevents one man from beating and scourging another, 
is a total prohibition of slavery. Nor can slavery exist where 

* This view was nearly correct as to the army ; but the loss of Mexican lives, 
including peasants, women, and children murdered, and who died of pestilence, 
was far greater than that of the Americans. 



212 THE WILMOT PROVISO. 

such law is enforced. Indeed, while you leave the great first 
law of nature, "self-defence," unrepealed, you will exclude 
slavery. Leave to man the right of protecting his person and 
defending his life, and you cannot enslave him. Now, Sir, 
should we acquire territory of Mexico, Congress must legislate 
for its government until it shall be admitted as a State. And 
who will deny that we may pass laws to punish violence and 
outrage ? Who will stand up here in the presence of the nation, 
and say that Congress will not possess the power to leave all 
the inhabitants of that territory in possession of the right to 
defend their persons, their virtue, and their lives, against the 
violence and brutality of those who would fain assail them ? 
If any member of this body would meet me on this point, and 
hazard his reputation by avowing such doctrines, I should be 
delighted to hear him. On the contrary, I should be obliged 
to any man who will point me to the power which Congress 
possesses under the Constitution, to repeal the law of nature 
and of nature's God, — to take from man his right of self- 
defence, and make him the property of his fellow man. 

If we possess the power to degrade one half or two thirds of 
the people, and convert them into property, and vest the title 
to them in the other portion of community, we may surely 
vest in one man, or in a larger number of men, the title to all 
the others. Sir, is such doctrine to be listened to in an Ameri- 
can Congress ? We hold " that all men are created free and 
equal, and are endowed by their Creator with certain inaliena- 
ble rights, among which are life, liberty, and the pursuit of 
happiness ; that to secure these rights, governments are insti- 
tuted among men." But it is now said that we have no con- 
stitutional power to form a government for such purposes in 
any territory which we possess, or which we may hereafter 
acquire. I think such doctrine will be heard with astonish- 
ment by the people of this government, as well as by those of 
other nations. Our revolution was based upon those "self- 
evident truths " to which I have alluded, and our government 
was founded on them. But we are now told that we have no 
right to legislate for freedom; that our legislative functions 



THE WILMOT PROVISO. 213 

can only be exerted in extending and increasing the curse of 
human bondage. God only knows what doctrines we shall 
next be called to listen to. 

Gentlemen from the South have constantly referred to what 
they term " the guaranties of slavery in the Federal Constitu- 
tion." I am myself unable to comprehend their meaning, by 
the use of that language. I have made the inquiry on this 
floor for the article or section in which such guaranty may be 
found ; but, to this day, I have found no lawyer, statesman, or 
jurist, who could point me to it. I hesitate not to say, there is 
no guaranty of slavery in our political compact. Slavery is 
purely a State institution, over which this government pos- 
sesses no power, either to establish, sustain, or to abolish. This 
has ever been the sentiment of the entire South, until within 
the last three years, when they discovered that it was necessary 
to have Texas, in order to hold their slaves in bondage. Then 
a new constitutional theory was started. But, Sir, suppose 
that every slave in the nation should leave his master to- 
morrow, and start for Canada or Mexico ! Our government 
has not the power under the Constitution to arrest or send back 
one of them. Or should a slave escape from Virginia to Ohio 
soil, and while his master should endeavor to arrest him, the 
slave, in self-defence, should slay the master ; there is no law 
of the Federal Government, or of our State, that would pun- 
ish him for it. Yet we hear much said in regard to "federal 
guaranties of slavery ." I repeat that I am unable to compre- 
hend what they mean by this language. If their slaves run 
away, or kill their masters, or destroy their master's property, 
or refuse to labor, no master would think of calling on this 
government for indemnity. Yet they will talk of guaranties, 
without object and without meaning. 

During the debate, we have heard it asserted repeatedly, 
that the slave is the property of his master. On what right 
does the master claim title to his slave as property ? It is the 
same title by which the pirate claims title to the goods of his 
victim. It is the same by which the highwayman claims title 
to your purse. It is founded in violence, and maintained by 



214 THE WILMOT PROVISO. 

crime. Whenever the slave becomes possessed of physical force 
sufficient, he may relieve himself from bondage by any means 
in his power, provided he does not injure innocent persons. 
He may, without incurring any moral guilt, use such violence 
as he may deem necessary to effect his release from bondage, 
even to the taking of his master's life. He is called property 
by southern gentlemen. But suppose the slaves of the South 
were to rise and overpower their masters, and compel them to 
labor by aid of chains and scourges ; they would then have 
precisely the same title to their present owners as property 
which their masters now have to them. This, Sir, is the only 
property which man can hold in man. 

We read in Scripture, that " God gave man dominion over 
the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over 
every living thing that moveth upon the earth." This is the 
title by which we claim property in the brute creation ; but 
man can claim no such title to his fellow man. We, as a nation, 
in 1804, gave evidence to the world of the light in which we 
hold the doctrine that man may be held as the property of his 
brother man. At that time, Algiers held a number of our 
American citizens as slaves. They claimed them as property. 
Their title was the same as that by which southern masters 
hold their slaves. It was by physical force. There was less 
injustice on the part of the Algerines than there is on the part 
of southern masters. They had held their victims in bondage 
but a few years ; while our slave-holders have kept theirs in 
servitude for ages. But how did we treat their claim of title? 
Why, Sir, we pronounced them "barbarians;" declared them 
unworthy of associating with civilized nations, or even to main- 
tain an existence upon earth. We sent an armed force there, 
and from the cannon's mouth proclaimed to the world the just 
and bloody fate of those slave-holders who claim to' hold the 
image of God as property. 

Decatur, Israel, Caldwell, and Somers, offered up their lives 
in the conflict which released the grasp of those barbarians 
upon our people. At the western entrance to this capitol, we 
pass the beautiful monument reared to their memories. They 



THE WILMOT PROVISO. 215 

fell while opposing, by their swords, this doctrine of property 
in man. Many a slave-holder that day " bit the dust " in 
attempting to maintain the doctrine now advanced on this floor. 
Sir, if this theory, now the scoff of infidel nations, is to be 
adopted in this body ; if -our fellow-citizens, by thousands, are 
to march to Mexico and shed their blood for the purpose of 
maintaining this doctrine, let us tear down that monument, 
raze it to its foundations, scatter to the four winds of heaven the 
inscriptions which commemorate the deeds of the mighty dead, 
blot out our records of the past, and let our nation commence 
a new career of violence, oppression, and infamy. 

But, as though no absurdity could be too great for this body, 
we are told that "a God of justice has ordained and established 
slavery;" and "that the Scriptures of Divine Truth have 
furnished authority for holding men as property." I had hoped 
that our holy religion might have escaped this slave-holding 
sacrilege. Do gentlemen worship a God of oppression, of 
licentiousness, and of blood ? It is a notorious fact that the 
average life of slaves, after entering the cotton plantations of 
the South, is but seven years ; and on the sugar plantations, but 
jive years, — that is, the whole number of slaves on these 
plantations are driven so hard as to close their existence within 
those periods. Their places are supplied by new purchases 
from the slave-breeding States, and these in turn are also 
sacrificed to the master's cupidity. Is the taking of life in this 
manner less aggravated murder than it would be to slay them 
at once ? Is there less crime in torturing a man so as to cause 
his death in five or seven years, than there would be in slaying 
him outright ? Again, Sir : look at yonder slave prison ; 
view its gloomy walls ; enter its cells ; witness the sighs and 
groans and tears of its unhappy inmates, doomed to a southern 
slave market ; note the unutterable agony of that mother, who 
has been torn from her home and family, and all she holds 
dear. Rumor speaks of one who, thus confined with two of 
her children, became frantic with her suffering, and, in a trans- 
port of horror, murdered her children, and then put a period 
to her own existence, rather than meet the doom that awaited 



216 THE WILMOT PROVISO. 

her. Yet we are told, even by those who minister at slave-hold- 
ing altars, that these " things are dictated by God himself." 
To me the doctrine appears impious. I would sooner be an 
infidel than render homage to such a Deity. I loathe and detest 
such doctrines, whether they emanate from laymen or profes- 
sed divines. The mind that can impute the moral corruptions, 
the reeking crimes of slavery, to a holy, just, and pure God, 
would, in my opinion, sustain the most horrid rites of Paganism ; 
would worship in temples stained with blood, and minister at 
altars smoking with human sacrifice, if necessary to sustain 
the curse of slavery. I regard the devotees of Juggernaut far 
more consistent than such Christians. 

Mr. Chairman, this whole body is now theoretically in com- 
mittee for the purpose of considering the state of the Union. 
The practice was adopted during the revolution, and is unknown 
to all other legislative bodies. After the colonies had formed a 
confederation for the purpose of mutual defence, the mainte- 
nance of their Union became a matter of great solicitude, and was 
regarded as their only hope for establishing our national inde- 
pendence. Congress, therefore, frequently resolved itself into 
a committee composed of the whole body, in order to consider 
the state of the Union. If any part of it was in danger ; if 
any portion of it complained, or felt dissatisfied, this committee 
took the subject into serious consideration, and applied the 
necessary remedy. It was felt necessary then to maintain a 
union of feeling among the people, and to cultivate a spirit of 
the most perfect harmony between all parts of the republic. 
' Sir, in imitation of their example, we, the representatives of 
this mighty nation,- have now resolved ourselves into a commit- 
tee for the purpose of taking into consideration the "present 
state of our Union." I, therefore, desire to call the attention of 
the committee to that subject. 

One of the stipulations contained in the Articles of the Con- 
federation of 1778, declared that the then existing Union should 
be perpetual, and that no change or alteration should be made 
without the consent of each of the several States. But it was 
soon discovered that radical defects existed in that confederated 






THE AVILMOT PROVISO. 217 

government ; and the statesmen of that day saw clearly that it 
could not be maintained. 

In the short period of nine years, the Union of 1778 was 
abandoned, contrary to, and in direct violation of, the stipula- 
tions of the old Articles of Confederation ; and a Constitution 
was adopted, as was emphatically expressed in the preamble, 
" in order to form a more perfect Union." The new Union 
formed in 1787, was limited by well defined boundaries. It 
embraced certain States, together with the territory north-west 
of the Ohio river, and east of the Mississippi. Slavery existed 
in the original States ; but our fathers, in order to leave a last- 
ing memorial of their intention to confine it to its then existing 
boundaries, had excluded it forever from all the territory then 
in the possession of the government. Less than twenty years, 
however, elapsed, before it was discovered that certain com- 
mercial advantages would be gained by obtaining Louisiana. 
Mr. Jefferson said distinctly that there was no power in the 
government to make such an addition to the then existing 
Union ; and that an amendment to the Constitution was neces- 
sary, in order to render such an act binding upon the States. 
I am not aware that any statesman of that day denied the doc- 
trine ; but all the States, by common consent, received the ter- 
ritory thus purchased into political fellowship ; and it thus 
became a part of that Union, which from that period existed in 
its modified form until the purchase of Florida, which was 
obtained by treaty, and, by consent of each of the several 
States, it also became a part of this confederation. This 
vast accession of slave territory was received to the political 
fellowship of the free States, by their own unanimous consent. 
I think no statesman of that day, or of this, believed that they 
were compelled by any provision of the Constitution, to enter 
into a political union with foreign slave-holders, who inhabited 
the territory thus brought into association with us. But the 
time approached when new doctrines and new constitutional 
principles were necessary, to maintain an institution fast sink- 
ing into contempt among civilized nations. 

Our Executive was informed that slavery would probably 
19 



218 THE WILMOT PROVISO. 

soon be abolished in Texas, and that civil liberty was likely to 
extend over that republic. He deprecated such an event, and, 
under the pretence that it was our duty to prevent the abolition 
of slavery, and consequent extension of liberty, proposed to 
annex it to this Union, where he seemed to think that oppres- 
sion, human degradation, and crime would be protected and 
maintained. Attempts were made to annex the two govern- 
ments by treaty ; but the constitutional power rejected the 
offer. Recourse was then had to joint resolutions, a mode for 
effecting that object never dreamed of by any statesman, until 
it was suggested by the desperation to which the slave power 
was then reduced. Then, Sir, the representatives of the slave- 
breeding and of the slave-consuming States in this body de- 
clared that the people of New England, the descendants of the 
Puritan fathers, should be transferred from the union formed 
in 1787, to a political fellowship with the blacklegs and slave- 
mongers of Texas, in order to sustain African servitude in that 
government. Thus, Sir, have our rights been made the sport 
of slave-holding politicians, and the people of the free States 
rendered the instruments of oppression to our fellow men. 
Foreigners, aliens to this republic, have been brought into 
this hall to pass laws for the government of northern freemen. 
Men who, fifteen months since, were the sworn supporters of a 
foreign slave-holding government, founded upon the principles 
of perpetual slavery, sit here to control the interests, and to 
determine the rights, of those whose fathers encountered the 
dangers of many a battle field, that they and their descendants 
might be free and independent of foreign influences. 

"When Washington and his compatriots framed our Constitu- 
tion, and solemnly declared " that no person shall be a repre- 
sentative in Congress until he shall have been seven years a 
citizen of the United States," and " that no person shall be a 
Senator until he shall have been nine years a citizen of the 
United States," they did not dream that these important pro- 
visions were to be so soon trampled upon, and this hall, conse- 
crated to American liberty, was to be defiled with the presence 
of strangers, citizens of a foreign government, who deny the 



THE WILMOT PROVISO. 219 

" self-evident truths " on which American liberty is founded, 
and who buy and sell the image of God. Sir, before Him who 
knows my inmost soul, I declare that I would rather have seen 
these beautiful pillars crumbled to dust, and this splendid edi- 
fice shaken from its foundations, " so that not one stone should 
remain upon another," than to have witnessed this humiliation 
of the free North. 

Nor is this all. We have assumed the war which these 
foreigners had waged against Mexico, to prevent the abolition 
of slavery in Texas. The expense of that unjust and unnatural 
conflict, is to rest upon the people of the free States, and upon 
their descendants. Our officers and soldiers are sent to Mexico 
to sacrifice their lives, that Texians may hold their grasp upon 
their fellow men ; and commit abuses, outrages, and crimes 
with impunity. This, Sir, is the state of our union with 
Texas. It is the union which binds the oppressed to his super- 
cilious lordling. It is the union which a slave feels for his 
master. It is an unwilling, dishonorable, a hated union. 
Yet, I am aware that many of our public men speak of main- 
taining the Constitution ; as though Congress, or the Execu- 
tive were, in some respect, controlled by an instrument, which 
has long since become obsolete, which has, in fact, ceased to 
exist, except in name. I am unwilling to mock the people by 
any such deception. I believe that ninety-nine out of every 
hundred, in our free States, would rejoice to see the resolutions 
annexing Texas to these States repealed, and our modified 
Union of 1787 restored. Indeed, I believe the President and 
his cabinet would now rejoice to exchange Texas for a peace 
with Mexico. 

In conclusion, permit me to say to the country, that our 
political horizon is overcast ; " clouds and darkness are round 
about us ; " impenetrable darkness shuts the future from our 
view. Foreign war and internal strife, animosities and heart- 
burnings, indicate that this nation is doomed to suffer the just 
penalty incurred by the oppression, outrage, and crime which 
we have perpetrated upon our fellow men. If God deals out 
to offending nations retributive justice, we cannot escape his 



220 THE WILMOT PROVISO. 

displeasure. Yet, when the just penalty of our transgressions 
shall have been visited upon us ; when thousands more of our 
brethren shall have fallen victims to this unholy war, and tens 
of thousands more, widows and orphans, shall weep and mourn 
under bereavement; when the immorality brought upon our 
nation, by this war, shall have tortured the hearts of hundreds 
of thousands of mothers and wives and daughters, and the 
righteous punishment for our transgressions shall have been 
meted out to us ; our rulers, our legislators, will acknowledge 
that " righteousness alone exalteth a nation" while " sin is a 
reproach to any people" 



PRIVILEGES OF MEMBERS OF CONGRESS. 



MISREPRESENTATIONS CORRECTED — THE RESOLUTION DEFINED — RIGHT 
OF MEMBERS TO VISIT PUBLIC INSTITUTIONS — MOBS — THEIR DESIGNS — 
ENCOURAGED BY MEMBERS — DEFIANCE — ATT ACKS REPELLED. 

[The reader will recollect that some seventy or eighty slaves attempted to 
escape from the District of Columbia on board the schooner Pearl, in April, 
1848; that they, together with the captain (Drayton,) and the mate (Sayres,) 
were captured and imprisoned in the jail at Washington; that Mr. Giddings 
visited them the next morning ; that a mob collected, opened the lower gate 
of the prison by force, and ascended to the one which opened into the hall 
where Mr. Giddings was conversing with Captain Drayton, and threatened his 
life if he did not leave the prison immediately. This he refused to do. The 
next day, Mr. Palfrey introduced a resolution to inquire into these facts. Tnis 
called forth a very exciting debate, in which several southern members made 
Mr. Giddings the object of their bitterest denunciation. On the third day, he 
replied to these assaults in the following speech. After he closed his remarks, 
a slave-holding member moved to lay the whole subject on the table, and the 
motion was sustained.] 

Mr. Speaker, — Before entering upon the subject of the 
resolution under consideration, I will say that, after so fre- 
quently expressing my views in regard to the powers of this 
government concerning slavery, after so often denning my 
position on that subject, I could not have believed that any 
gentleman here would hazard his reputation for candor by im- 
puting to me an intention to interfere with the institution of 
slavery in the States. I call the attention of the House and 

* Speech upon the Resolution to inquire whether Members of Congress had 
been threatened by a lawless mob. Delivered in the House of Representatives, 
April 15, 1848. 

19* 



222 PRIVILEGES OF MEMBERS OF CONGRESS. 

of the country, both North and South, to the fact, that no 
member in this hall, no person out of it, has ever heard me, in 
public or in private, by speech, resolution, or intimation, claim 
such powers to be vested in this government, nor have they 
ever heard me desire the exercise of such powers. For three 
days of excited discussion, in which many southern gentlemen 
participated, I believe all of them have distinctly or by impli- 
cation, charged me with such designs. Now, Sir, before the 
nation, I challenge these gentlemen to the proof of what they 
have thus asserted. If any man can lay his hand upon any 
speech of mine, any resolution introduced, or any intimation 
given by me, claiming such power, or that I desired the exer- 
cise of such power, let him now stand forth and avow it. 

I assert that these imputations are unfounded, entirely false, 
and unworthy of gentlemen holding seats in this body ; and I 
now call upon those who have uttered them to stand up here 
before the nation, and maintain the truth of their assertions. 
For that purpose, I now offer to yield the floor to any member 
who dares attempt to justify the imputations thus thrown out. 
(Mr. Giddings paused for a short time, and no member rising, 
he proceeded.) 

Mr. Speaker, where are those gentlemen who, in their 
excited moments, have charged me with entertaining and utter- 
ing opinions in conflict with the Constitution which I am sworn 
to support ? It is a duty which I owe to myself, and to those 
whom I represent, to disabuse the public mind of these impres- 
sions. I disavow all such opinions, purposes, motives, and 
designs. The country is aware that I was once driven from 
this hall for daring to offer resolutions denying that such powers 
existed in this government. 

I will now repeat, perhaps for the hundredth time, that the 
people of the slave States, in my opinion, hold the institution 
of slavery at the disposal of their own will, with supreme and 
unlimited powers to continue or abolish it at their own plea- 
sure ; that it is strictly a State institution, over which this 
body, nor the Federal Government, possess any powers what- 
ever, except the power to legislate for the return of fugitive 



PRIVILEGES OF MEMBERS OF CONGRESS. 223 

slaves. And when I say this government has no power to 
interfere with slavery, I mean just what I say. I intend to be 
understood as saying that the people of the free States have 
the same indisputable right to be free and exempt from the 
support of slavery, which the slaves States have to sustain it ; 
that this government has no constitutional power to involve us 
of the free States in the turpitude of slavery. We possess the 
positive, unqualified, and indisputable right to remain exempt 
from its continuation, unstained with its guilt, and disconnected 
with its crimes. "We will not extend that institution, nor 
create slave markets, upon soil that is now free, nor will we 
associate with new slave-holding States. 

We hold it a cardinal principle never to increase the slave 
power in the Senate by admission of slave States ; nor shall 
we consent to any extension of the slave power whatever. 
Our motto is — " Keep your slavery where it is ; manage it 
in your own way, and according to your own discretion; 
with it we will have nothing to do." I now speak as a legis- 
lator. My duties as a member of Congress are so plain, that 
the way-faring man, though a fool, could not mistake them. 
This body, Sir, never had the constitutional power to estab- 
lish it in this district. It exists here in direct violation 
of the spirit and of the letter of the Constitution. When, 
therefore, Congress enacted the law of 1801, by which sla- 
very in this district was established and continued, they not 
only violated their duty to God and to their fellow men, but 
they disregarded their constitutional powers, and violated the 
sacred compact of union between the States. Now, Sir, it is 
one of my objects, and of those who act with me, to repeal all 
those unconstitutional laws which connect the people of the 
free States with slavery, and wholly to separate this government; 
from all support and maintenance of that institution. We will 
not continue involved in its crimes. I notify gentlemen, that 
we will purify ourselves from its contagion. These objects 
and designs we will accomplish, God helping us. No earthly 
power shall deter us from every honorable and lawful effort to 
bring a " consummation so devoutly to be wished." Nor will 



224 PRIVILEGES OF MEMBERS OF CONGRESS. 

we sustain any man for President, or for any other office, who 
is willing to involve our people of the free States in the turpi- 
tude and disgrace of slavery. "We contend for freedom — for 
the rights of man. 

I have, on but one occasion, permitted myself in this hall to 
be drawn into discussion upon the subject of slavery in the 
States. When a distinguished southern statesman, then a 
member of the Executive Cabinet, (Mr. Calhoun,) in his 
official character, undertook to establish the doctrine that sla- 
very was necessary to the enjoyment of mankind, and that it 
was a humane, benevolent, and philanthropic institution, I 
made some comments on his letter when it came before this 
House, and was legitimately under discussion. But gentlemen 
cannot expect us to remain silent on the subject of the slave- 
trade in this district while it is^ supported by our laws, although 
such discussion may endanger slavery in every State of the 
Union. Are we to be told that we shall not speak on the sub- 
ject of the slave-trade here, lest it affect the institution in the 
States ? Unite with us, repeal the laws that involve us in its 
guilt, separate this government from all participation in its 
support, relieve the people of the free States from its burdens 
and its disgrace; then we will be silent on the subject — not 
till then. 

Again, while southern members bring the subject of slavery 
in the States before the House, they cannot expect us of the 
North to feel very particularly delicate in answering them. 

Before entering upon the subject more legitimately under 
consideration, I must be permitted to say farther, that I have 
no intention to reply to those personal attacks that for three 
days have been made upon me. They are unbecoming the • 
dignity of a legislative body ; they are equally unsuited to the 
occasion. We are discussing the rights of humanity, — a sub- 
ject dignified and solemn. The eyes of the nation and' of the 
civilized world are upon us ; and, Sir, I cannot demean myself 
so much as to reply to those personal invectives which have 
been so liberally heaped upon me. 

The subject of slavery, which has now been before us for some 



PRIVILEGES OF MEMBERS OF CONGRESS. 225 

days, was not introduced by myself, nor by any Northern man. 
The resolution of my friend from Massachusetts (Mr. Palfrey) 
does not allude to it; yet it has been forced upon us by slave- 
holders, and northern men cannot avoid it. I regard it as 
inappropriate, but have no alternative but to meet it, or admit 
my inability to oppose the arguments advanced. I do not 
regret its introduction. It must be met, discussed, and settled 
in this hall. It has become the great absorbing topic among 
the people of the nation. It is discussed in the legislatures of 
our several States, in our political conventions, in our town- 
ship meetings, in our newspapers, our literary periodicals, our 
religious meetings, our sermons, and in our religious essays, 
and in our prayers. It is the subject of conversation at the 
fireside and by the wayside. It has occupied most of the time 
of this body during its present session. It occupies the atten- 
tion of the President and of his cabinet. Southern statesmen 
are arguing in its behalf, and our army is fighting for its exten- 
sion. The toiling millions of our nation are made to contribute 
a portion of each day's toil to rivet the chains of servitude 
upon their brethren. It guides the appointment of our foreign 
ministers, dictates the selection of officers for our army and 
navy, and controls the election of our Presidents. Sir, it 
would be useless for us to attempt an evasion of this subject. 
It must be discussed. 

I will now ask attention to the subject more immediately 
before us. 

The propositions contained in this resolution are few and 
simple. It would appear impossible to misapprehend them. It 
proposes to inquire, — Firstly. Whether a lawless mob existed 
in this district for two nights next preceding the day on which 
it was offered, setting at defiance the laws and constituted 
authorities of the United States? And, Secondly. Whether 
members of this House have been menaced by such mob ? 

The entire object of the resolution is to obtain official in- 
formation on these two definite points, and to place that 
information on record, that it may be sent forth to the country. 
If there has been such a mob, it is due to the people of the 



PRIVILEGES OF MEMBERS OF CONGRESS. 

nation that they should know it ; if there has not been such a 
mob, it is due to the people of this district that they should be 
disabused of the charge. Let the truth be known. "Why 
should we seek to disguise facts, or to withhold them from the 
public ? 

That such a mob existed, up to the time of introducing this 
resolution, is as well known to every member of this body, as 
any other fact which has transpired beyond our personal obser- 
vation. Indeed, I am told that many members of this House 
witnessed the collection of the mob, and saw some of their 
lawless depredations. There can be no doubt that, on the 
evening of Tuesday, the 18th instant, several hundred persons 
collected on Seventh street, with the avowed intention of 
destroying one of the newspaper establishments of this city.* 
Their object was publicly proclaimed. They moved toward 
the accomplishment of their purpose, and actually commenced 
the work of violence by throwing stones, breaking windows, 
and doing damage to the building, and injuring some of the 
police who interposed to protect the property of the publisher. 
That the auxiliary guard of the city only saved the building, 
type, presses, etc., by an exhibition of the most determined 
resistance, for which the officers and men are entitled to much 
praise. 

The mob, finding themselves strongly opposed, publicly ad- 
journed to meet the next evening. During "Wednesday, the 
17th, collections of half-grown boys, loafers, and drunken row- 
dies, attended by ruffian-looking strangers in various parts of 
the city, left no doubt as to their designs to carry out their 
intentions during the evening of that day. 

At nine o'clock on "Wednesday evening, it is said that some 
thousands were collected in and near Seventh street, in the 
vicinity of the printing-office alluded to. That their intention 
to destroy that office was publicly avowed and proclaimed. 
That further violence took place, and further damage was 
effected. That during both evenings " abolitionists " were 

* The National Era. 



PRIVILEGES OF MEMBERS OF CONGRESS. 227 

denounced, and publicly threatened with violence and death. 
That members of this body were named, their lodgings inquired 
for, and propositions made violently to seize their persons, and 
take their lives. I do not say there was danger of such out- 
rage being committed, but I do know that members of this 
House, and men who were not members, expressed the opinion 
that it would be unsafe for certain members of our body to be 
seen in the vicinity of those meetings. I know that individuals 
of this body were in good faith advised to arm themselves, and 
provide for their own protection. I know that friendly letters 
were received by individuals on this floor, advising them to 
arm themselves, and others of a threatening character came to 
them through the post-office. 

On Tuesday I visited the prison of this district, and saw the 
mob collected there; an account of which was read by my 
friend who moved this resolution.* The mob at the prison, I 



* This statement was drawn by Mr. Giddings, dated 20th April, and is in 
the following words : 

"I, J. E. Giddings, a member of the House of Representatives, state: That 
during the forenoon of yesterday I visited the jail of this district. I was not 
acquainted with the keeper ; and when I amved I announced to him my name, 
and that I was a member of this body. That I further said to him, that I 
wished to see the persons confined there on a charge of carrying away slaves 
from this district. I told him that I wished to say to them that they should 
have the benefit of counsel and a legal trial, and their rights should be pro- 
tected, and desired him to be present. He went with me to the passage that 
leads to the cells. 

" While conversing with these men in the presence of the keeper, a mob 
came to the iron gate at the head of the stairway, and demanded that I should 
leave forthwith. The keeper informed them that he would not open the gate 
unless I left the building immediately. That I refused to do. The keeper 
assured them that he would not open the door until they retired. I was further 
informed, that the mob had compelled the guard at the lower gate to deliver 
up the key to them ; and in this way they had opened that gate, and by that 
means obtained access to the passage at the head of the stairs. 

" After the mob had left the stairs, and entered the lower passage, the keeper 
and myself and the Hon. E. S. Hamlin, who had visited the jail as attorney 
for the prisoners with me, came down to the lower gate, in front of which the 
mob was assembled. He opened the gate, and I walked out. This morning, 
I have been informed by a gentleman who is a stranger to me, but who gays he 



228 PRIVILEGES OF MEMBERS OF CONGRESS. 

believe to. have been composed principally of slave-dealers, 
from Baltimore, Richmond, Alexandria, Annapolis, and of this 
city, collected to purchase the persons who were confined there 
for having fled from slavery. Like the offensive buzzards 
gathering around disgusting carrion, these cormorants had 
gathered around the slave-breeders, who claimed to own the 
children and mothers confined in that slave-market. It was 
this mass of moral putridity which constituted the mob at the 
prison. 

I am informed that the mob collected on Seventh street on 
Tuesday and "Wednesday evenings, was led on, excited, and 
encouraged by slave-dealers from the various cities mentioned, 
and by slave-breeders from the country and cities of this 
region ; while some of the clerks in the departments, and offi- 
cers of the city, united with them ; and that members of this 
body, in their speeches here, encouraged them. The respecta- 
ble citizens of this city generally, I have no doubt, were not 
only opposed to the mob, but deeply regretted its existence. 

On "Wednesday night, the mob again adjourned to meet the 
next evening. Up to this time, no movement had been made 
to put down those riots, either by the President, or by any 
other officer of the United States, or, so far as our knowledge 
extended, by any other officer except those of the auxiliary 
guard. Thus far it had set the laws at defiance. And it was 
at this opportune period, while every movement gave evidence 
of a continuance of these riotous depredations, that my friend 
brought forth the resolution before us, proposing an inquiry 
into these facts. 

Gentlemen for three days have held out to the country, that 
the resolution represented that members of this body had been 
in danger. Sir, it neither alludes to, nor hints at, such a fact. 
The preamble recites, that common fame represents that mem- 
was present and heard the proposition made by individuals to lay violent hands 
upon me as I came out of the prison, one of whom, he informed me, "was a 
Mr. Slatter, a slave-dealer from Baltimore, whom he states to have been active 
in instigating others to acts of violence." 



PRIVILEGES OP MEMBERS OF CONGRESS. 229 

bers have been menaced, threatened, and proposes to ascertain 
whether it be so. That is the length and breadth and extent 
of the proposition. Now, Sir, I may be permitted to inquire, 
whether it would not be more statesmanlike for gentlemen to 
meet the proposition before us, than it is thus to build up a 
man of straw, merely for the purpose of tearing it down ? 
Again, gentlemen have represented me as introducing this reso- 
lution. They seem to have mistaken even the author of the 
proposition in the phrenzy of excitement. My friend who 
introduced it, will not thank them for this attempt to transfer 
the honor of that act from him to my humble self. That gen- 
tleman introduced it upon his own responsibility, and at the 
dictates of his own judgment. 

Again, it has been urged that the resolution asks protection 
for the members referred to. It is to me perfectly incompre- 
hensible how gentlemen should give this construction to a pro- 
position simply to inquire into facts. Why, Mr. Speaker, it 
really would appear that the flight of so many human chattels, 
called " slaves" from this city, has positively demented every 
slave-holder of this House. 

But again, Sir, it is 'said that I went to the prison, where I 
had no right to claim the protection of this body. Suppose it 
were so, still it is no answer to the proposition before us, which 
is merely to inquire as to facts. I cannot, however, pass over 
this assertion without a more particular notice. That prison 
was erected, in part, with the money of my people, as much as 
this capitol. It is as much under the control of our officers, as 
the building in which we are now sitting. It is as much con- 
trolled by our laws as this capitol, or the post-office, or the 
treasury buildings. I had the right to examine how our laws 
were executed ; to understand who was in prison ; to know 
what degree of humanity is exercised there by the servants of 
the people. My constituents have a right to know how their 
prison is managed, and for what purpose it is used. They 
have a right to understand whether it is used to confine weep- 
ing mothers, and sighing fathers, and helpless infants, guilty of 
no other crime than a love of liberty. I will not condescend 
20 



230 PRIVILEGES OF MEMBERS OF CONGRESS. 

to argue this question. My constituents know their rights, and 
if gentlemen here have not learned their own privileges, they 
had better study them. The rights of myself, and of my peo- 
ple, shall be maintained to the extent of my humble powers. 
They, Sir, have the right to understand these manifestations of 
slave-holding violence ; and, whether you pass this resolution 
or not, you cannot, you shall not, keep that information from 
them. 

Gentlemen here have constantly represented me as seeking 
the protection of this House. Yes, Sir, for three days I sat 
here, and heard gentlemen representing to the country that I 
was seeking protection at the hands of the members of this 
body. The resolution proposes no such thing ; the gentleman 
who offered it represented no such wish ; I have intimated no 
-such desire. Why, then, are these misrepresentations put 
; forth ? Why is falsehood resorted to ? Do gentlemen sup- 
pose me incapable of exposing these flagrant violations of 
•truth; or did they believe me so destitute of spirit, that I 
dared not hold them up to the contempt of an intelligent and 
virtuous people ? 

Why, Sir, does not every member of this House know, does 
not the country know, that the mob extended to this hall ; that 
members of this House were also numbered with the mob ; 
that while slave-dealers and those who breed mankind for mar- 
ket were collected in those spacious galleries, members on this 
floor denounced me from this forum, — declared themselves 
" ready to unite with the mob to drive me from this hall and 
from the district," — declared that I " ought to be hung as high 
as Haman," — and that they "were prepared to justify the 
-mob to the fullest extent?" Does any person suppose me 
capable of asking protection from such men ? No, Sir ; I have 
too often witnessed the spirit of slave-holding violence on this 
floor to ask protection of the members of this House. I never 
did degrade myself by such request ; I never shall. If I ever 
•had cause to ask protection from human violence, it was from 
the violence of members on this floor. Sir, could I so far for- 
get my self-respect as to ask protection at the hands of men, 



PRIVILEGES OF MEMBERS OF CONGRESS. 231 

who, in this hall, and before the nation, were endeavoring to 
excite the rabble to deeds of violence ? Never, Sir ; never. 
Let the House purify itself, protect its own honor, and main- 
tain a dignity becoming an American Congress, and I will pro- 
vide for the protection of my person in my own way. 

I again repeat that the object, the whole object of the resolu- 
tion, is to send forth facts to the people. I wish the people of 
the free States to understand that, when representatives visit 
the public institutions of this district in their official character, 
they are beset by slave-dealers, by those who drive women to 
market. That such beings in human shape attempt to dictate 
to us where we shall go, and how long we shall stay ; that they 
attempt to tell us that our lives are at their disposal, and that 
our existence will be hazarded, if we disobey their directions. 
Sir, I desire that the people should understand that slave-hold- 
ing members on this floor, in their public speeches, justify these 
base indignities " to their full extent." 

I feel deeply humbled, when I consider that these encour- 
agements of the mob were mostly put forth by members on this 
side of the House, professing to belong to the same political 
party with myself. And it is but an act of justice that I should 
also say, that I am informed, that after my friend had intro- 
duced this resolution, and an exciting debate had sprung up, 
both in the Senate and in this hall, and the attention of the 
country was being called to these facts, the President tendered 
to the officers of the city the military forces of the United 
States, and directed the employees of government to prepare to 
put down the mob. No man will suspect me of courting the 
President's favor ; but I desire to do him justice, as well as 
those who, professing to belong to the same political party with 
myself, yet endeavor to excite the rabble to violence. And 
now, Sir, I will take my leave of the resolution ; I have stated 
the object which brought it forth ; that object was to place 
facts before the country. As to its adoption, I feel entirely 
indifferent. The facts will go forth ; the object of the mover 
has already been attained. The information intended to be 
elicited has already spread far and wide. The freemen of the 



232 PRIVILEGES OF MEMBERS OF CONGRESS. 

North will arouse from their silent stupor, and soon we shall 
hear their indignation expressed in language not to be misun- 
derstood. 

When the pending resolution was brought forward, propos- 
ing a simple inquiry as to facts, it was instantly seized upon 
by southern members as the basis of an exciting debate con- 
cerning slavery. They insisted upon going back, and inquir- 
ing into the circumstances out of which this mob and the 
threatened violence arose. This was done upon that principle 
of slave-holding ethics, which teaches that if the captain and 
crew of the schooner " Pearl " had assisted slaves to escape 
from this district, it would be just and proper for slave-holders 
to destroy the newspaper press of this city, and threaten vio- 
lence to members of this body. It should be distinctly borne 
in mind, that this subject of slavery was brought forward 
exclusively, and the discussion has been confined almost 
entirely, to southern men. 

Well, Sir, what are the facts at which almost the whole 
slave-holding fraternity of this body has been thrown into such 
a ferment ? Why, Sir, it is said that some seventy-six men, 
women, and children, living in this district, possessing the same 
natural right to the enjoyment of life and liberty as gentlemen 
in this hall ; feeling the galling chains of slavery chafing and 
festering into their flesh ; themselves shut out from the social 
and intellectual enjoyments for which they were designed by 
their Creator ; bowed down in abject servitude, surrounded by 
moral darkness, robbed of their labor, and shut out even from 
the hope of immortality under the laws which we have enacted, 
and which we still refuse to modify or repeal ; inspired with an 
ardent desire to enjoy the rights with which God has endowed 
our race, went on board a schooner lying at one of the wharves 
of this city, and set sail for a " land of liberty." When they 
reached the mouth of the river, adverse winds compelled them 
to cast anchor. Thus detained, we may imagine the anxiety 
that must have filled their minds. How that slave-mother 
pressed her tender babe more closely to her breast, as she sent 
up to the God of the oppressed her silent suj)plication for deliv- 



PRIVILEGES OF MEMBERS OP CONGRESS. 233 

erance from the men-stealers who were on their track; for 
those bloodhounds in human shape were in hot pursuit, clothed 
with the authority of the laws enacted by Congress, and now 
kept in force by this body, and they seized upon those wretched 
fugitives, and brought them back to this city, and thrust them 
into yonder prison, erected by the treasure of this nation. 
There they remained until Friday, the 21st instant, when 
nearly fifty of them having been purchased by the infamous 
" Hope H. Slatter," who headed the mob at the jail on Tues- 
day, were taken in daylight from the prison to the railroad 
depot, and from thence to Baltimore, destined for sale in the 
far South, there to drag out a miserable existence upon the 
cotton and sugar plantations of that slave-consuming region. 

The scene at the depot is represented as one which would 
have disgraced the city of Algiers or Tunis. Wives bidding 
adieu to their husbands ; mothers in an agony of despair, una- 
ble to bid farewell to their daughters ; little boys and girls 
weeping amid the general distress, scarcely knowing the cause 
of their grief. Sighs and groans and tears and unutterable 
agony characterized a scene at which the heart sickens, and 
from which humanity, shrinks with horror. Over such a scene, 
that fiend in human shape, Slatter, presided, assisted by some 
three or four associates in depravity, each armed with pistols, 
bowie-knife, and club. Yes, Sir, by virtue of our laws, he 
held these mothers and children, these sisters and brothers, 
subject to his power, and tore them from all the ties which 
bind mankind to life, and carried them south, and doomed them 
to cruel and lingering deaths. 

Sir, do you believe that these members of our body, who 
stubbornly refuse to repeal those laws, are less guilty in the 
sight of a just and holy God than Slatter himself? We, Sir, 
enable him to pursue his accursed vocation, and can we be 
innocent of those crimes ? * How long will members of this 

* While Mr. Giddings was speaking, a letter was laid upon the table before 
him, from which the following extract is taken : 

" Among the unfortunate slaves who were lately recaptured, was a brother 
and three sisters, mulattoes, all very moral and religious. The girls, one in 
20* 



234 PRIVILEGES OF MEMBERS OF CONGRESS. 

House continue thus to outrage humanity ? How long will the 
people themselves remain partakers in this enormous wicked- 
ness, by sending to this hall men who can here speak of their 
association with these Heaven-daring crimes in the language of 
ribald jesting? If other members sanction and approve such 
torture, far worse than ordinary murder, / will not. It is unbe- 
coming a Christian people ; it is unsuited to the age in which 
we live. Why, Sir, what a spectacle do we present to the civ- 
ilized world? Yesterday, we assembled with the citizens of 
the district, in front of this capital, to rejoice and sing in honor 
of the people of France, many of whom offered up their lives 
to attain the liberty which we ourselves enjoy. While we 
were thus collected together, and singing the soul-stirring Mar- 
seilles hymn, and shouting praises to our brethren who, on the 
other side of the Atlantic, have achieved their freedom, and 
driven their monarch from his throne and country, a different 
scene was witnessed on the avenue before us, where some fifty 
slaves, destined for the southern market, were marched to the 
railroad depot. The clanking of their chains, their sighs and 
groans, mingling with our songs and shouts of praise in favor 
of liberty, ascended to heaven, and entered the ear of the God 
of the oppressed. Yes, Sir, while we were thus professing 
our admiration of freedom, we, who now sit in this hall, were, 
at that moment, sustaining a slave market in this city, far more 
shocking to the feelings of humanity than can be found in any 
other part of the civilized world. And, Sir, gentlemen in their 
zeal to uphold the slave-trade in this district, propose to strike 
down the freedom of debate in this hall, consecrated to free 
discussion, and even to hang members who dare speak in favor 
of liberty. I refer to the remarks of the gentleman from Ten- 



particular, is very fair and pretty. The brother was hired by Mr. , as a 

coachman, and it is said his employer offered a large sum for the purpose of 
preventing them from being sacrificed to the basest of purposes ; but it was in 
vain ; for the fiends were too avaricious, and they were carried away by night 
to Baltimore. It is said that a gentleman offered a thousand dollars for one of 
the girls." (There is no doubt of the perfect accuracy of this statement.) 



PRIVILEGES OF MEMBERS OF CONGRESS. 235 

nessee, (Mr. Haskell,) who is reported to have said in his 
speech, on Wednesday, as follows : 

" Now a strange state of things was presented here. Members of this body, 
as he believed, and felt ready to charge, had been engaged, by the course of 
conduct they pursued on this floor and out of this hall, in the deliberate attempt 
to scatter the seeds of insurrection and insubordination, if not rebellion, among 
the slaves in this district. Men on this floor, under the garb of philanthropy 
and love of human liberty, had been endeavoring to perpetrate felonies, for 
which they ought to swing as high as Haman. He spoke the plain truth. He 
was willing to have his words measured, and he held himself responsible for the 
language he used. An attempt had been made on this floor to abolish slavery 
in the District of Columbia in the form of law, if they could, and in violation of 
the Constitution; and, baffled and foiled in that, these mock philanthropists 
were now, as he believed before God, attempting to abolish slavery in this dis- 
trict, by inciting the negroes to leave their masters. 

" Mr. Haskell (continuing) charged that the conduct of these men, their lan- 
guage on this floor and out of this House, had been such as to produce this state 
of things, — a disposition to insurrection and rebellion among the slaves in this 
district. He held in his hand a resolution which he intended to move, and 
which he should move, by way of amendment, when this House entertained the 
resolution of the gentleman from Massachusetts, having for its object an inquiry 
into the conduct of these members, and, if they were found guilty, their expul- 
sion from this body, as unworthy to hold seats on this floor.' : 

The gentleman charges me with uttering sentiments on this 
floor, and out of this House, which have tended " to excite the 
slaves to rebellion, and to produce this state of things" by 
which I suppose he means their attempt to escape from slavery. 
For doing this, he thinks I " ought to hang as high as Haman ; * 
and that the House ought to expel me for thus daring to give 
utterance to the honest sentiments of my heart. 

Mr. Speaker, I will inform that gentleman, with all sincer- 
ity, that it is too late in the day to attempt to seal the lips of 
northern representatives in regard to the slave-trade, or on any 
other subject which comes before this body. I give notice to 
that gentleman, and to ail others, that I shall speak just what I 
think on any and on every subject which comes before us. It 
is my intention to call things by their right names, and to speak, 
so far as I am able, in such direct, plain, and simple language, 
as to be understood. 

It is true that the freedom of speech has been put down in 
this hall ; it was for years trampled under foot by the slave 



236 PRIVILEGES OF MEMBERS OF CONGRESS. 

power. I sat here during several sessions of Congress in 
degrading silence, and often listened to the supercilious tirades 
of southern members against myself, and against the advocates 
of liberty, while I was not permitted to reply. The slave 
power then reigned triumphant in this body. Sir, it is well 
known that, for asserting in this House some of the plainest 
principles of constitutional law, I was censured and driven 
from my seat here. But, thank God, after years of toil and 
effort, we have regained the freedom of debate. And now, I 
say to the slave-holders present, we shall never again surrender 
it. When members here shall cease to enjoy the privilege of 
speaking their minds, and representing the views and wishes 
of their constituents, my people will send some other man 
to Congress, or they will cease to be represented in this 
body. 

Why, Sir, does the gentleman from Tennessee expect that I 
am to ask him or any other member what I shall say, when I 
shall speak, and how I shall say it ? Do southern gentlemen 
suppose they can bring into this body the practices which they 
pursue on their plantations ? Sir, they forget the theatre on 
which they are acting. They forget that they are among free- 
men. They surely think themselves among slaves, accustomed 
to crouch and tremble at their frowns. This hall is not the 
place for the display of supercilious dictation. Such traits of 
character are but poorly suited to the dignity of legislation. 
They will not be submitted to by gentlemen who know their 
rights, and have the spirit to maintain them. What, Sir, are 
we to sit here and listen to such language ? I would advise the 
gentleman from Tennessee to read the Constitution of the Uni- 
ted States ; to study the spirit and genius of the government 
of which he is a member ; to learn the privileges and duties, 
and endeavor to catch the spirit and inspiration of an Ameri- 
can statesman. His thoughts will then be free as the winds of 
heaven, and he will look with ineffable contempt upon all efforts 
to restrain the freedom of debate. When this proposition to 
restrain the freedom of debate shall be published in my district, 
the school-boys will laugh at its absurdity. 



PRIVILEGES OP MEMBERS OP CONGRESS. 237 

But the gentleman thinks that my language in this hall has 
excited a love of liberty among the slaves. As to that I have 
made no inquiry. If it has imparted to them information, or 
inspired them with a desire to regain the rights which God has 
given them, I shall rejoice at it. I would not desist from 
speaking truth in this hall, if all the slaves in the universe 
were listening to me. No, Sir ; if I had the power I would, 
from this forum, give to every slave south of Mason and 
Dixon's line a perfect knowledge of his rights. I would 
explain to their understanding the oppression that weighs down 
their intellects and shuts out truth from their comprehension. 
I would explain to them the outrage which has robbed them of 
their humanity, reduced them to the level of chattels, and 
subjects them to sale like brutes in the market. Could my 
voice be heard by them from this hall, I would teach them that 
they came from the hand of the same Creator as ourselves, 
and were endowed by Him with the same inalienable rights as 
those who now lord it over them. I would inform them that 
they are our brethren, and candidates for the same immortality 
with us. 

Mr. Gayle, of Alabama, desired to inquire of the gentle- 
man from Ohio, (Mr. Giddings,) if these sentiments were not 
now uttered in the hearing of slaves ? 

Mr. Giddings replied, that the gentleman from Alabama 
perhaps could answer that question more accurately than him- 
self. I (said he) know not whether such persons be present. 
I hope there may be some to hear me ; and if the utterance of 
such truths can teach them how to release themselves from 
bondage, God knows their redemption draws nigh. No, Sir ; 
I would say to gentlemen, " go tell your slaves how choleric 
you are, and bid yOur bondmen tremble," but come not here 
and threaten to expel and to hang the representatives of free- 
dom for giving utterance to the sentiments which they enter- 
tain. Gentlemen may play the tyrant on their plantations, 
hold their fellow men in subjection, may cause his lacerated 
flesh to quiver with the lash, but they shall not impose silence 



238 PRIVILEGES OF MEMRERS OP CONGRESS. 

upon northern men, nor dictate the language we shall use on 
this floor. 

Mr. Gayle inquired if the gentleman alluded to him when 
he spoke of the flesh being made to quiver by the lash ? He 
never used the lash on his slaves. They would not accompany 
him here, because they were afraid the abolitionists would skin 
them. • 

Mr. Giddings resumed. The gentleman's statement shows 
to what depths of degradation slavery can reduce the immortal 
mind. He has been so far successful as to teach his slaves to 
hug their chains, and to shudder at the thought of being free. 
He has driven from their minds their instinctive love of liberty. 
These facts show the most horrid characteristic of that institu- 
tion. It blots out the intellect, and reduces man, created in 
the image of his God, to the level of brutes. That gentleman 
dare not teach his slaves to read the Word of God. It would 
subject him to punishment in the penitentiary of his State 
were he to do it. Nor need we go to Alabama to find such 
laws. If, Sir, you pass over the river (Potomac) lying before 
our windows, and on its southern bank attempt to kindle in the 
dormant intellect of a slave the hope of a future life, by teaching 
him to read the Holy Scriptures, you will be liable to an incar- 
ceration in the penitentiary of that Old Dominion, of which we 
hear so often and so much in this House. Yes, Sir, it is 
regarded as a crime to teach a slave to read the Word of God 
in this Christian land — this land of sabbaths, and ministers, 
and bibles, and slaves. 

But the gentleman from Tennessee is not the only member - 
here who has assailed my right to speak in this hall the dictates 
of my own judgment. A gentleman from North Carolina 
(Mr. Venable) complains that I stated in this hall that the 
laws of Ohio allowed every person to defend his natural right 
to life and liberty ; and that if a slave on Ohio soil should, in 
defending himself, slay his master, we would not hang him to 
gratify the slave-holders of the South ; and that I declared " I 
would call him a gallant fellow." Now, Sir, in slave States 



PRIVILEGES OF MEMBERS OF CONGRESS. 239 

they have a statute law depriving the slave of the right of self- 
defence. Not so with us. Ohio has no such law, and never 
will have. The defence of those rights to life and liberty with 
which our Creator has endowed us, I regard as a solemn duty, 
and look upon every man who complies with this obligation as 
worthy of my respect. In discussing the legal rights of the slave, 
I felt it my duty to inform the masters of this principle. But 
the gentleman seems to think that the slaves will learn what I 
said, will know their rights, and being once informed of their 
duty to defend their liberty when they get on to free soil, he 
apprehends they will do it. Now, I shall certainly regard 
myself as fortunate if my poor remarks shall have enlightened 
both master and the slave. And" I now repeat, that we would 
not hang a slave for such an act were it to please all the slave- 
holders in Christendom. I wish, however, to appeal to the 
conscience of that gentleman. I understand that he belongs 
to the Methodist church. Now, the great and good founder of 
that denomination (John Wesley) has declared slavery to be 
" the sum of all villanies." 

Mr. Venable said the gentleman was mistaken, that he was 
a Presbyterian. 

Mr. Giddings resumed. Can it be that the gentleman is a 
Presbyterian, and yet holds slaves, and regards slavery a 
blessing ? Would he sit down on the Sabbath with his slave, 
who is also a brother in Christ, of the Presbyterian faith, at 
the sacramental board, commemorative of the Lord's supper and 
sacrificial death ; partake with him of the bread and the wine, of 
the body and the blood of a crucified Redeemer ; and on Mon- 
day sell that brother, bearing the image of his God, for paltry 
lucre, and yet claim to be a Presbyterian ? No, Sir, I feel 
constrained to deny such an absurdity. It cannot be so. No 
man can be a true Presbyterian who barters his fellow men for 
gold, or who transforms man into chattels, and shuts out the 
Scriptures of truth from his brother in the church. 

Why, Sir, I can scarcely realize that I live in the nineteenth 
century, or that I am in a Christian land. Do we exist in an 
age when even our holy religion is thus perverted to the sup- 



240 PRIVILEGES OF MEMBERS OF CONGRESS. 

port of slavery ? Are we to be told that religion and slavery- 
walk hand in hand ; that virtue and vice have commingled ; 
that purity and crime have blended together ? 

Mr. Venable begged to say to the gentleman from Ohio, as 
he had alluded to the subject of religion, that he was no Meth- 
odist, though he highly respected that sect. He was a Presby- 
terian ; but he would refer the gentleman to the Epistle of 
Paul to Philemon, from which that gentleman would learn that 
Paul did not tell servants to run away from their masters, but 
to return back to them. When the gentleman from Ohio could 
bring evidence to show that he was better, wiser, and holier 
than Paul, he would listen to his counsels, and not till then. 

Mr. Giddings resumed. I think the gentleman is too much 
excited for a Presbyterian. By what authority does he pro- 
nounce Onesimus a slave ? Was he not a hired servant, such 
as we of the North employ and pay for their labor ? Did 
Paul direct that he should return to slavery ? No ; he com- 
manded that he should be received as a brother. But the 
gentleman from North Carolina has attempted to press St. 
Paul into a justification of slavery. What is slavery, and what 
are its effects ? Why, Sir, a gentleman, (Mr. Clay,) once a 
member in the other end of the capitol, and a slave-holder, of 
accurate information, some years since stated that the average 
life of slaves, after entering upon the sugar plantations, was 
only five years, and upon the cotton plantations only seven 
years. That is to say, they are driven so hard at labor as to 
destroy the lives of the whole of them every five and seven 
years, upon an average. Now, Sir, is it not as much murder 
to destroy the life of our fellow man, by a torture of five or 
seven years, as it would be to strike him down at a blow ? 
Yea, is not this prolonged torture a refinement in cruelty ? I 
have no time to refer to the licentiousness, or indeed to the 
almost total obliteration of moral sentiment, to be found not 
only among slaves, but among all slave-holding communities. 

Why, Sir, it is said, and I believe with perfect truth, to be 
no unusual thing for slave-holders to sell their own children as 
slaves. Brothers are said to traffic in the bodies of their 



PRIVILEGES OF MEMBERS OF CONGRESS. 241 

fathers, sons, and daughters. Such crimes have no names. Yet 
the gentleman from North Carolina represents St. Paul as ap- 
proving, and even enjoining slavery, with all its concomitant 
iniquities. Well might the great and good Wesley denounce 
slavery as the " sum of "all villanies," for it is so in fact. It is 
not merely murder, for it takes life by a slow and regular 
process of torture. It is not ordinary theft, for it steals not 
only the property and the treasure of men, but it takes from 
them their intellectual enjoyments. It is not merely robbery, 
for it robs man of himself. The essential elements of all these 
crimes, in their most aggravated form, are comprehended in 
the term slavery. And Scripture is quoted to justify such 
appalling wickedness. Sir, if I entertained such sentiments, I 
would abjure my religion, and turn Pagan. These arguments 
are put forth by Presbyterians. The general assembly of that 
church, some thirty years since, declared slavery to be " in- 
herently sinful ; " and, of course, it must be offensive to God, 
and to all good men. 

But to return to those gentlemen who have threatened to 
expel me, to drive me from this district, to hang me for speak- 
ing of slavery as I regard it. I wish to inform them distinctly 
that, before I conclude what I have to say, I intend to give 
utterance to the solemn convictions of my judgment in regard 
to that institution ; and, if they do not wish to listen to me, 
they will of course be at perfect liberty to leave the hall. 

And now I wish to address a few words to gentlemen in 
regard to the slave-trade of this district. We all know the 
fate of slave's taken from this country to the slave-consuming 
regions, the Golgotha of this nation. 

We are all conscious that the fifty persons taken by Hope 
H. Slatter from this city last Friday, are doomed to cruelty, 
torture, and premature graves. They have gone to painful 
and lingering deaths ; and the momentous question comes home 
to each of our consciences, on whom rests " the deep damna- 
tion of their taking off? " There is but one answer. All who 
have aided or lent their influence to sustain the law of Con- 
gress which authorizes such infernal deeds. Nor is that all ; 
21 



242 PRIVILEGES OF MEMBERS OF CONGRESS. 

those of us who have failed to exert our powers to repeal these 
disgraceful laws are guilty for our neglect. I dare not claim 
to be exempt myself. We are all involved in the dread 
responsibility. History will record the fact, and transmit it to 
unborn ages, that ive, the members of this House, at this age of 
light and knowledge, and of civil liberty, maintain and keep in 
force a law for selling fathers and children, mothers and tender 
babes, to torture and to legalize murder. In the day of retri- 
bution, will not the blood of those victims stain our gar- 
ments ? 

Our guilt is daily increasing. Every victim of this barbar- 
ous law enhances our responsibility. The gentleman from 
North Carolina exults that his State was not concerned in the 
importation of slaves, and connects the " horrors of the middle 
.passage " with New England cupidity. But does that in any 
.way relieve the gentleman from his own responsibility in sup- 
porting the slave-trade in this district ? He, Sir, has con- 
stantly opposed the abolition of this infamous traffic, carried on 
here before our own eyes, and attended with greater mental 
suffering than was the African slave-trade in the last century. 
He must answer for his own sins. 

I admit that a fearful responsibility rested upon those of our 
New England fathers who encouraged or engaged in that 
"execrable commerce." I justify them not. I condemn them 
for it. There is but one excuse for them. They lived in a 
darker age than the present. The force of truth, the rights of 
man, and the claims of God, were not brought to bear upon the 
people of that age in the concentrated rays with which they 
have since pierced the intellectual darkness which then locked 
up the sensibilities of our race. New England has long since, 
not only abandoned the slave-trade, but she has discarded the 
institution of slavery, and proclaimed her hostility to all op- 
pression. The sin of our fathers ought not to be visited upon 
their children. But, Sir, would that gentleman extenuate the 
guilt of the present age, by showing that even greater crimes 
were committed by those who have gone before us? They 
must answer for the sins which they committed. We are 



PRIVILEGES OF MEMBERS OF CONGRESS. 243 

responsible for our oion acts. And when that gentleman boasts 
that North Carolina did not engage in the African slave-trade, 
he should bear in mind that his is a slave-breeding State; 
that one portion of her people get their wealth by raising and 
selling their fellow men ; that the slaves thus reared in this 
Christian land must, of necessity, be far more intelligent than 
those of Africa, and capable of far greater suffering ; that 
the slave-trade now carried on in that State, actually inflicts 
more distress and heart-rending anguish, in proportion to the 
number of its victims, than did the foreign slave-trade. 
Therefore I would advise the gentleman not to boast of the 
moral purity of his people. They are now, at this time, 
engaged in crimes that would have shocked the humanity of 
the African slave-dealers of the last century. 

We have been assured repeatedly, during this debate, that if 
we continue thus to express our detestation of slavery, that the 
southern States will secede from the Union. Now I would 
advise gentlemen to spare us from those threats. During half 
a century, the slave-power has controlled this government; 
holding northern rights and northern interests subject to the 
burdens of slavery, which has constantly sat like an incubus 
upon the whole nation, paralyzing our energies, and retarding 
our prosperity. 

The Union of our fathers has long since been abandoned, 
discarded, and trampled upon by this slave-power. Texas has 
been forced upon us, in violation and in total subversion of the 
Constitution. In direct and palpable conflict with its most 
obvious provisions, slave-holding foreigners from Texas now 
sit in both Houses of Congress, and vote in the enactment of 
laws to govern the rights and control the interest of northern 
freemen. A war has been waged, two hundred millions of 
dollars expended, and eighty thousand lives have been sacri- 
ficed, for the purpose of extending slavery, to confirm the slave 
power in its control of the government; and now we are 
threatened with a separation of the slave States from our 
Union. Of such an event, / have neither hopes nor fears. 
Dependent on us for protection, for support, indeed for the 



244 PRIVILEGES OF MEMBERS OF CONGRESS. 

very existence of slavery, I have no expectation nor apprehen- 
sion that they will abandon us to our best interests, and throw 
themselves upon the tender mercies of their slave population, 
who for ages have received nothing at their hand but oppres- 
sion and outrage. No, Sir; when I shall see a condemned 
criminal upon the gallows, with the rope about his neck, and 
fastened to the beam above, become impatient, and, in order to 
" dissolve the Union " between himself and this world, jump 
from the scaffold before the drop is permitted to fall, then, Sir, 
and not till then, will I believe that the slave States may has- 
ten the terrible judgments that await them by seceding from 
the Union. Not till then will I believe that they can be driven 
from us. 

The gentleman from Virginia, (Mr. Bayley,) as he has often 
done before, has attempted to show that what he calls the 
" abolition movement " originated in England, and is now kept 
up by British emissaries, both in this Hall and through the 
country. The gentleman has not the merit of originating the 
charge. It was made many years since by a member from his 
State, (Mr. Wise). I suppose there can be no misunder- 
standing as to the terms he uses. When he speaks of the 
" abolition movement," I presume he refers to the efforts now 
making to extend human liberty, to restore to mankind their 
natural rights, to strike off the chains of slavery from the 
limbs of its victims, to stop the accursed traffic in human flesh 
to which I have already alluded. That is what we all under- 
stand by his language. It is difficult to trace out the origin of 
these movements in favor of liberty. Some trace them back 
to the time when the " sturdy barons of England " extorted 
from King John the great charter of English liberty. Others, 
to the revolution under Cromwell ; and others date it from the 
commencement of our own revolution of 1776. If the gentle- 
man, however, refers particularly to philanthropic efforts in 
behalf of the oppressed colored people, I deny the correctness 
of his history. The first effort in favor of the equal rights of 
the colored man, put forth in England, so far as my knowledge 
extends, was by Granville Sharpe, in 1757, for the release of 



PRIVILEGES OF MEMBERS OP CONGRESS. 245 

"Jonathan Strong," a slave to David Lisle. The slave was 
liberated on habeas corpus, and the owner, in the true slave- 
holding spirit, challenged Sharpe to mortal combat for thus dar- 
ing to maintain the rights of humanity. Sharpe continued his 
efforts until joined by Wilberforce and other distinguished phi- 
lanthropists, whose labors did not cease until their final tri- 
umph. 

But long previous to that time, — indeed, as early as 1646, — 
the good people of Massachusetts, in general court, had taken 
measures to restore certain colored persons brought from Africa 
to this country as slaves, and actually sent them back to their 
homes. If, therefore, the gentleman refers to efforts in behalf 
of colored men, Massachusetts is entitled to the honor of first 
moving on the subject of abolition. The legislature of that 
State was the first on this continent to give universal and equal 
liberty to all her people. Her abolition act, I believe, dates as 
far back as 1780. The people of the other New England 
States, and of New York, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania, 
soon became abolitionists, and repealed their slave laws, and 
gradually restored liberty to their slaves. All this, and much 
more, was done in this country during the last century ; while 
the gentleman dates the movement in England subsequent to 
1824, and in this country as late as 1832. 

But I wish to call the attention of the gentleman to a very- 
powerful anti-slavery paper, drawn up by one Thomas Jeffer- 
son, in 1776, in which he asserts it to be a "self-evident truth" 
that "men are created equal, and are endowed by their Creator 
with certain inalienable rights, among which are life and 
liberty." Now I desire to know whether he charges Mr. 
Jefferson with being operated upon by British influence ? 
Was John Hancock, and the other members of that Congress, 
acting under British influence when they signed the Declara- 
tion of Independence ? At that period, Virginia's noblest sons 
were the boldest advocates of freedom. " Give me liberty or 
give me death," was the soul-stirring sentiment of her eloquent 
Henry, and the watchword of her gallant sons who bled at 
Yorktown. Were they excited by British influence ? At the 
21* 



246 PRIVILEGES OF MEMBERS OF CONGRESS. 

close of the war, James Madison, when he penned the address 
of the Congress of the Confederation, asserted that "it had 
ever been the pride and boast of America, that the rights for 
which she contended, were the rights of human nature." Sir, 
if it be true that the spirits of those great men, from the 
regions of exalted intelligence, are observers of our discussions 
in this hall, what sensations must they have felt while that 
member stood here, in the presence of the nation, advocating 
oppression, degradation, and slavery? If capable of mortifi- 
cation and chagrin, methinks they must have turned from the 
scene with loathing and abhorrence. But, Sir, the gentleman 
says it is " British influence " that encourages this spirit of 
liberty. Yes, Sir, he would charge Benjamin Franklin with 
being under British influence, when he acted as president of 
the first abolition society in the United States, and signed the 
first abolition petition ever presented to Congress. And the 
eccentric Randolph was under British influence when, in this 
hall, with scathing eloquence, he denounced the "inhuman 
traffic in slaves " then carried on in this district, and which has 
produced the present discussion. 

But, Mr. Speaker, those great men of Virginia have passed 
away, and with them the glory and the moral power of the " Old 
Dominion" has departed. Then she stood first among the 
States of this Union. Now she has fallen, and " there is none 
so poor as to do her reverence." In the words of Thomas J. 
Randolph, she " has become a vast menagerie, where men are 
reared for market, like oxen for the shambles." 

The gentleman, however, dates the commencement of what 
he calls the abolition excitement in the year 1832. Why he 
has fixed that as the time, he has failed to explain, and I am 
wholly unable to conjecture. At that period, the slave power 
controlled this government, and directed its energies almost 
exclusively to the building up of the slave interests of the 
South. Its influence was even prostituted to the support of the 
coastwise slave-trade. Soon after this, our army was employed, 
in company with bloodhounds, to arrest fugitive slaves in Flor- 
ida, and deliver them to their masters. The treasure of our 



PRIVILEGES OF MEMBERS OF CONGRESS. 247 

people was appropriated to these disgraceful purposes. No 
member of this body then sounded the alarm, or called the 
attention of the people to the fact that the Constitution was 
outraged, their rights held in contempt, and the nation dis- 
graced for the benefit of slavery. The political horizon was 
overcast, and all was dark and dreary. 

It was at such a time that Massachusetts sent to this hall a 
man who had mingled with the heroes and patriots of the Rev- 
olution, who had drank deep at the fountains of learning, and 
had caught the inspiration of the better days of our Republic. 
His talents, his experience, his reputation were equal to the 
task which lay before him. With a spirit of self-sacrifice, with 
ceaseless vigilance, with unrivalled powers, he entered upon 
the work of reformation. A portion of the representatives of 
Virginia arrayed themselves against him, and advocated the 
cause of oppression and slavery, in opposition to the doctrines 
of Jefferson, of Madison, of Washington, and of Henry. The 
right of petition had been stricken down ; the freedom of debate 
had been scouted from this hall ; and when that world-honored 
champion of freedom, venerable for his age, his learning, and his 
virtues, stood forth in this body, and maintained the right of the 
people to ask for the abolition of slavery and the accursed slave- 
trade in this district, a representative from Virginia assailed 
him and those who advocated the rights of man, and charged 
them with acting under " British influence." The gentleman 
from Virginia now merely repeats the charge, and calls it his 
own thunder. Let him use it, if it amuses him ; I am sure it 
will be harmless to others. 

The gentleman has spoken of the deception of the British 
government, in regard to philanthropy. Upon that subject I 
neither attack nor defend the government of England. My 
duties are with my own government, — to correct its abuses, to 
improve its administration, to raise its character, and to main- 
tain its honor and integrity. Nor am I able to discover how 
the hypocrisy practised by British statesmen can diminish the 
responsibility under which we are placed. If, in the abolition 
of slavery they acted hypocritically, it can in no degree exten- 



248 PRIVILEGES OF MEMBERS OF CONGRESS. 

uate our guilt in maintaining the slave-trade here. The breed- 
ing of slaves, and the traffic in human flesh, carried on in the 
gentleman's district, is no less offensive to God, or hateful to 
good men, because British statesmen may have acted deceit- 
fully. They must answer for their acts ; we for ours. 

The tone and manner of the gentleman was not unexpected 
to me. Excessive vanity and supercilious vaporing seem to 
constitute a part of the slave-holding character ; it grows out 
of the intercourse between master and slave. On this point, 
Mr. Jefferson, in his " Notes on Virginia," says : 

" The whole commerce between master and slave is a perpetual exercise of 
the most boisterous passions, the most unremitting despotism on the one part, 
and degrading submission on the other. 

" The man must be a prodigy who can retain his manners and morals unde- 
praved by such circumstances." 

All who were present to hear his speech on Friday last, will 
admit that the gentleman from Virginia is no prodigy. 

The gentleman has seen fit to eulogize the institutions of his 
State. In reply, I will only say that, could the liberties and 
oppression of the people of Virginia be brought into common 
stock, and then each were to draw out his aliquot proportion of 
slavery and of liberty, it would be pronounced at once the most 
barbarous and oppressive government upon earth. Suppose 
that gentleman, by such equitable apportionment, were to 
receive, at the hands of an inhuman overseer or master, a 
scourging, until his lacerated flesh should hang in quivering 
shreds, or to see his daughter torn from his embrace, and sold 
at public auction for nameless purposes, should we, in such 
case, hear him extol the humanity of his native State ? Were 
he to receive his share of the oppression and misery and tor- 
ture inflicted upon the slaves of that State, he would, methinks, 
be the last man hereafter to advocate a system which has been 
discarded by the Mohammedan barbarians of Algiers and of 
Tunis. I would not have referred to Virginia or her institu- 
tions, had not the gentleman dragged them before the House, 
and forced them into debate. 

The gentleman, however, says that abolitionists look to the 



PRIVILEGES OF MEMBERS OF CONGRESS. 249 

insurrection of the slaves. Sir, who does not look to that 
inevitable result, unless the slave States remove the heavy 
burdens which now rest upon the down-trodden and degraded 
people whom they oppress ? Is there a slave-holder who can 
shut his eyes to this sure .finale of slavery? And why should 
we not expect it ? Were we thus oppressed, outraged, and 
abused, would we not use all the means which God and nature 
have placed within our power, to remove such evils ? Would 
not duty to ourselves, to our offspring, to God, and to human- 
ity, demand, that we should rise with one accord, and hurl our 
oppressors from us ? Can we justify our fathers of the revo- 
lution in their patriotic struggle for political freedom, and then 
turn round and condemn the slaves of the South for breaking 
the chains which hold them in physical bondage, and in intel- 
lectual degradation ? No, Sir ; no lover of justice, no unbi- 
assed mind, could blame them for asserting and maintaining 
their inalienable rights. When that time comes, as come it 
must, we shall say with Jefferson, " the Almighty has no attri- 
bute that will permit him to take side with the slave-holder." 
Thus spoke the sage of Monticello ; and I will merely add, that 
with him " I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is 
just, and that his justice cannot sleep forever." 



MEXICAN WAR. 



DUTY OF STATESMEN TO FORETELL POLITICAL EVENTS — PROPHECY FUL- 
FILLED—EXECUTIVE FAITH VIOLATED IN THE SURRENDER OF OREGON — 
CONTROL OF THE GOVERNMENT BY THE SLAVE POWER— THE EFFECT OF 
ANNEXING FOREIGN TERRITORY. 

[The author had taken strong grounds upon the resolution to terminate the 
joint occupation of Oregon, having asserted that the Executive would surrender 
all north of the forty-ninth parallel of latitude, and that the Executive could not 
be driven into a war with England. For these assertions he was violently 
assailed by the press of both parties. Having witnessed the fulfilment of his 
prophecy, he embraced the opportunity to vindicate his positions in the follow- 
ing speech.] 

Mr. Chairman, — I am now called on to vote for this bill, 
authorizing the Secretary of the Treasury to issue notes to the 
amount of five millions dollars to carry on the war against 
Mexico, in which we are unfortunately engaged. That war 
was commenced without my vote, and against the dictates of 
my judgment, and of every feeling of my heart. I believed it 
wrong, unjust, and criminal, and I am now unwilling to make 
myself a party to it, or in any degree to participate in its guilt. 
I shall at all times be glad to vote for any appropriation to 
withdraw the army from Mexico, and to stop the work of blood- 
shed. But I shall vote against this bill and every other in- 
tended to aid in carrying forward the work of devastation in 
Mexico. 



* Speech on the Bill to authorize the issuing of Treasury Notes to supply the 
present wants of the Government. Delivered in Committee of the whole House 
on the state of the Union, July 14, 1846. 



MEXICAN WAR. 251 

But I rise at this time for the purpose more particularly of 
vindicating myself from all responsibility for the present state 
of our public affairs ; and to expose the errors and the policy 
which has involved our nation in this unholy war. 

I regard it the duty of statesmen to forewarn the people of 
approaching danger. Nor is it difficult, generally, to foretell 
great political events with almost perfect accuracy. I was 
somewhat surprised to hear my colleagues on the opposite side 
of the House complain of the Executive for having surrendered 
to Great Britain so large a portion of our territory in Oregon. 
Indeed, I think those gentlemen have disregarded the instruc- 
tion which they might have drawn from the past history of our 
government. Had they referred to it, they would have found 
that it has been for half a century controlled by the slave 
power. They and I have seen the slave-holding influence 
plunge the nation into the Florida war. We have seen the 
leading policy of the nation changed as often as the views of 
southern men have altered. At the bidding of the slave power 
we have fostered banks ; and, at the dictation of the same influ- 
ence, we have discarded and opposed them. "When bidden by 
the potent voice of the South, we have imposed heavy duties 
upon imported manufactures, in order to encourage domestic 
labor ; and then again, under the same guidance, has our policy 
been changed so as to approximate towards free trade. In 
short, Sir, for fifty years, we have constantly changed and 
shifted our sails upon the ship of state, in order to catch the 
changing southern breeze. 

From these important facts, statesmen are bound to draw 
instruction. From them, my colleagues and other western gen- 
tlemen might have easily foretold the result of the Oregon 
controversy. For my own part, I have never, for a moment, 
regarded it as doubtful. On the 5th of January last, while the 
resolutions authorizing the President to give notice to the Brit- 
ish Government for terminating the joint occupation of Oregon 
were under discussion, I felt it my duty to assure the House 
and the country that there was no possible danger of a war 



252 MEXICAN WAR. 

with England, in consequence of conflicting claims to that ter- 
ritory. 

I was aware that the President, in his inaugural address, had 
declared our title to the whole of Oregon to be " clear and 
unquestionable ; " that he had repeated the same declaration in 
his annual message. Yet, Sir, I felt confident that no danger 
to our peace need be apprehended. With this conviction rest- 
ing upon my mind, I expressed my views in the following par- 
agraph, taken from my remarks on that occasion. Speaking 
of the Executive, I said : 

" The consequences of seizing upon ' the whole of Oregon ' were not consid- 
ered. Mr. Polk, in his inaugural address, and in his annual message, evidently 
overlooked the momentous effect which his tAvice-declared policy would pro- 
duce upon the slave interest, to which he is indissolubly wedded. He and his 
cabinet and his party have made a fatal blunder. They wiU soon discover their 
error, and will recede from their position. With the same degree of confidence 
that I have in my own existence, I declare that they will, before the nation and 
the world, back out from their avowed policy, and will surrender up all that 
portion of Oregon north of the forty-ninth parallel of latitude." 

Now, Sir, I refer to this extract, to show my colleagues and 
the House that any man who has studied the operations of the 
slave interest upon this government, may foretell its action 
whenever the interests of the " peculiar institution " are con- 
cerned. I was fully conscious that a war with England must 
prove the overthrow of slavery ; and, although the Baltimore 
Convention and Mr. Polk had overlooked that most important 
consideration, I well knew that a distinguished senator, now in 
the other end of this capitol (Mr. Calhoun) would never be 
guilty of such a blunder. I was fully convinced that southern 
statesmen had at that time discovered the error into which the 
Executive had fallen, and that the whole force of their influ- 
ence would be brought to bear in favor of peace with England 
at any sacrifice. And the subject being within the control of 
the President, I then assured the House and the country that 
he would give up such portion of Oregon as was necessary to 
secure peace, rather than subject the slavery of the South to 
the dangers of a war. 



MEXICAN WAR. 253 

Now, Sir, I think, with these warnings from me, and with 
the experience of the past, western gentlemen should have fore- 
seen the surrender of our territory by the Executive, which has 
recently taken place. Why, Sir, so clearly did I foresee it 
myself, that I designated the identical line which now divides 
our territory from that of England. I declared that the " Pres- 
ident and his party would surrender all that part of Oregon 
lying north of the forty-ninth parallel of latitude." In saying 
this, I claim for myself no uncommon powers of perception. 
Conscious that the President would accept the first offer of a 
compromise which the British government should make, I had 
only to determine what that offer would be. I concluded that 
the selfishness of Great Britain would not prompt her to claim 
farther than to that parallel. In this, however, I was some- 
what mistaken. It seems that she demanded the whole of Van- 
couver's Island. My error was in "the estimate I placed upon 
the selfishness of England, and not as to the anxiety of Mr. 
Polk to arrange the controversy. For, as I have just remarked, 
I was sure he would accept the first offer, whatever it should 
be. The result has shown the perfect accuracy of my opinion. 
I will not pretend to say that it was not Mr. Polk's intention 
originally, to involve the country in a war with England. Far 
from it. I have no idea that the President or his Cabinet at 
that time had considered the effect which a war with England 
would have upon slavery ; and, at the commencement of the 
present session, I believe he fully intended to bring the nation 
into conflict with that country, and would have done so, except 
for the advice of southern statesmen. We are, therefore, 
indebted to southern apprehensions for our peace with Great 
Britain, as well as to southern influence for our war with 
Mexico. 

But our democratic friends were not alone deceived by this 
executive error and management. Many whig members of 
this body, and in the other end of the capitol, were apprehen- 
sive of a war, in consequence of the Oregon controversy. Our 
whig editors became alarmed at the indications of war, and 
represented to their readers that we were in danger of hostili- 
22 



254 " MEXICAN WAR. 

ties with Great Britain. I was determined to put such state- 
ments on the record as should show to the House and the 
country that I fully understood the management then going 
forward. I told our democratic friends, in explicit language, 
that they had been betrayed, and that Mr. Polk could not be 
kicked into a war for Oregon.* I stated my reasons for these 
assertions. I declared that a war with England would not 
only destroy slavery, but would ruin the Atlantic slave States ; 
that Mr. Polk was a slave-holder, acting under the influence of 
the slave power, and would do no act by which the institution 
would be endangered. I further stated, " he would find means 
to give up a part, or even the whole, of Oregon, rather than 
subject slavery to the sure destruction which a war with Eng- 
land would bring upon it." 

The perfect accuracy of my prediction is now manifest. I 
(call attention to it for the purpose of impressing upon those 
who hear me, or who may read my remarks, the important fact 
that this government has been, and now is, controlled by the 
slave-holding power of the South. I therefore say to my demo- 
cratic colleagues who have complained of the Executive for 
deceiving them in regard to Oregon, if you wish to understand 
what the action of Congress or the Executive will be on any 
given subject, go and consult the interests of the slave-holding 
'South ! learn the policy which southern statesmen think will 
best subserve their interests, and then rest assured that that 
course will be pursued. The eccentric Randolph never uttered 
a more obvious truth than that bitter reflection upon northern 
men, in which he declared that the South could always govern 
the North, " not (said he) by our black slaves, but by your 
white slaves" 

And while on the subject of vindicating myself, I will refer 
to another important event which lately occurred in this hall. 
I refer to the repeal of the tariff of 1842. While speaking upon 
the annexation of Texas, on the 21st May, 1844, 1 said : 

* This expression was actually used by Mr. Giddings iu his speech upon 
Oregon ; but he struck it out of the report as being too harsh to go before the 
public. 



MEXICAN WAR. 255 

" Let us admit Texas, and we shall place the balance of power in the hands 
of the Texians themselves. They, with the southern States, will control the 
policy and the destiny of this nation. Our tariff will then be held at the will 
of Texian advocates of free trade. Are our friends prepared to deliver over 
this great national policy to the control of Texian representatives ? Are the 
liberty-loving democrats of Pennsylvania ready to give up our tariff ? To 
strike off all protection from iron and coal, and other productions of that State, 
in order to purchase a slave market for their neighbors, who, in the words of 
Thomas Jefferson Randolph, • breed men for market like oxen for the sham- 
bles?'" 

Sir, I said much more at that time on this subject, feeling, 
as I then felt, that the vote on Texas was to determine the 
annexation question of protection to northern labor. Some of 
my personal friends desired me to speak upon the tariff while 
it was lately under discussion in this House ; but I felt that the 
time for that had gone by. I had endeavored to caution our 
friends against this disastrous result at a time when the vote of 
Pennsylvania might have saved the tariff of 1842, protected 
her interest in iron and coal, and saved many of her people 
from that distress and ruin which now awaits them. 

It is now more than two years since I declared to this House 
and the country, that if Texas were admitted, " our tariff would 
be held at the will of Texian advocates of free trade." This 
declaration was fully verified on the second day of the present 
month. The fate of the bill to repeal the tariff of 1842 was 
admitted on all sides to depend on the degree of protection 
extended to the article of salt. It was well known, that unless 
the importation of that necessary of life should be subjected to 
a pretty fair duty, the representatives from New York would 
vote against the bill, and that their vote would defeat it. The 
friends of free trade, therefore, rallied their whole force in favor 
of protecting salt. With the aid of the two representatives 
from Texas they succeeded by only one vote. That vote 
secured the passage of the bill in this House, and fully verified 
my prediction made in May, 1844. 

But the bill was carried through the Senate by a majority 
of only one vote, while both senators from Texas voted for it. 
Thus was my prediction most amply fulfilled. As I have 
already remarked, I then felt that the annexation of Texas 



256 MEXICAN WAR. 

was to determine the fate of northern industry. I regarded 
that as the time for the friends of free labor to rally in behalf 
of northern interests. But, Sir, opposition to that measure 
proved unavailing. The resolutions annexing Texas were 
passed. Her representatives took their seats on this floor ; 
and the first important vote given by them was to strike down 
the most vital interests of Pennsylvania, of New Jersey, New 
York, and New England, as well as of the northwestern States ; 
for I regarded the interest of those States as much involved as 
I do those of New England. I do not, in these remarks, charge 
southern men with inconsistency. I have no doubt that the 
cotton-growing interest, separately considered, may be bene- 
fited by free trade. It is opposed to all the other great 
interests of the country. In order to strike down the industry 
of the North, they must have the numerical force. To obtain 
this, they must extend the slave-holding territory. These 
objects were foreseen, and, indeed, they were openly avowed. 
The leading democratic organ in our State acknowledged these 
to be the objects of annexation as early as May, 1844. The 
Ohio Statesman, of that date, in an editorial article, declared 
that " the real objects of annexation were the perpetuation 
of slavery, and the political power of the slave States. Sir, 
their political power was extended, and we now see the con- 
sequences. The people of the free States will soon feel its 
weight, and will realize the loss they have sustained by their 
inactivity. 

I would not impugn the motives or the judgment of north- 
ern whigs, who hold out to their constituents the hope that they 
may by their political efforts regain the ascendency, and restore 
the lost rights of the free States. I may, however, be per- 
mitted to say, that when they shall have watched the opera- 
tions of the slave power as long and as carefully as I have ; 
when they shall have made themselves as familiar with its 
influences, its designs, and the agencies used to effect its ulterior 
objects, they will change their views. I may be wholly wrong 
in my opinions. God grant that time may show my error. 
But I should fail to express the solemn convictions of my heart 



MEXICAN WAR. 257 

if I were not to say, in the most emphatic terms, that the 
rights and the interests of the free States have been sacrificed ; 
and will not be regained until the North shall be awakened to 
its interests, its honor, and to its political duties. 

I will now turn my attention more directly to the bill be- 
fore us. 

In calling upon the people to contribute a portion of their 
substance to carry on this war, it is proper that they should 
understand its objects and designs. We hear this demand com- 
ing up to us through the public press from every part of the 
nation. The people desire to understand the benefits which 
they are to derive from the expenditure of this immense 
amount of treasure. What good is to come of it ? In what 
manner is the happiness of this nation or of Mexico to be 
increased ? 

Our army is to be enlarged by the appointment of some 
four or five major-generals, and towards a score of brigadier- 
generals, and an indefinite number of staff officers, and some 
thirty or fifty thousand rank and file. They are sent to 
Mexico, not to defend our own territory, nor to conquer that 
part of Mexico which lies east of the Rio Grande. General 
Taylor, with only three thousand troops, had driven the miser- 
able apology for an army there marshalled under the Mexican 
flag beyond the Rio Grande, before we passed the law for rais- 
ing any additional troops. He soon after crossed that stream with 
his forces, and took possession of Matamoras and other Mexi- 
can towns, and is now extending his conquest far into Mexico 
by direction of the President. Still the question recurs, What 
benefit are the people of the nation to derive from this con- 
quest ? What are the objects and designs of this war ? 

Sir, I was greatly rejoiced the other day on reading the 
report of the proceedings in the other end of the capitol, to- 
find that a distinguished senator had, in a very emphatic man-- 
] ner, demanded " What were the objects of this war ? " In my 
soul I regretted that this question had not been asked before 
war was declared. In this hall we did not enjoy the poor 
privilege of asking the question ; we were literally gagged into 
22* 



258 MEXICAN WAR. 

the measure. On the day following the passage of the bill, I 
availed myself of an opportunity to declare the objects of the 
war, so far as they were then developed. I distinctly stated 
the object to be conquest : not merely conquest of the Mexi- 
can territory on this side of the Rio Grande, but conquest 
beyond that river ! It is true that we are yet without official 
information as to the definite extent of the conquest intended. 
From certain anonymous publications in the government paper, 
and from official whisperings, however, we are led to judge that 
the intention of the President is, to obtain all that part of 
Mexico lying north of a line to be drawn from the Gulf of 
Mexico west to the Pacific Ocean, near the twenty-second 
degree of north latitude. This will give us the port of Tampico 
on the Gulf, and Mazatlan on the Pacific. It will add to our 
territory nearly twenty degrees of latitude, including a greater 
extent of country than that which now composes the twenty- 
four States lying east of the Mississippi, and will leave the 
Mexican government in possession of less territory than that 
which now composes three of those twenty-four States. 

In short, Sir, if this object be accomplished, it will be 
regarded as the conquest of Mexico ; for no gentleman who 
has read the history of our race will suppose that, having dis- 
membered her of five sixths of her territory, we shall then desist 
from farther aggressions. That these are the real designs of 
the Executive no one will doubt, who has carefully consulted 
the signs of the times. It is true that this object may possi- 
bly be defeated by the united efforts of those who really desire 
to perpetuate the form of a free government ; but, when I 
look at the apathy of the North upon the admission of the 
foreign slave State of Texas, by which our rights and our 
influence were torn from us, I can entertain but little hope. 
The slave power has thus far found means to accomplish all 
its ends ; and I can scarcely hope that, with all the power of the 
government in its hands, it will be less successful in future. I 
know that the power in the North is great, and if properly 
directed, might overcome all the difficulties which tame sub- 
mission to the slave influence has brought upon us. But at 



MEXICAN WAR. 259 

the moment when our rapidly increasing population is flowing 
into Oregon and California, — when free States are growing 
up in the former, and the latter gives promise of preparation 
for annexation, as a counterpart to Texas, — this vast southern 
country is grasped by this executive power, for the purpose of 
perpetuating our subserviency. 

It is expected that the MexiGan people will recede before 
the progress of our slave-holding population, so that slave 
States may be formed as fast as may be necessary to retain 
political influence in the southern hands. 

This magnificent scheme of extending the slave-holding 
power, will doubtless succeed in part, at least, if not fully ; and 
the free States, although possessing vastly greater population, 
will be in a minority in the Senate ; and the free North will 
become the mere stakes for which southern gamblers will play 
their political games. 

Here, Sir, a most important question is propounded to north- 
ern members : " What are our constituents, — what are the 
free States to gain by the state of things to which I have just 
alluded ? " We are called on to vote the money of our people, 
to continue this policy of conquest, rapine, and bloodshed, 
which is to subvert their rights and their interests, disgrace our 
nation, and subject millions of our race to degradation and sla- 
very. Yet, Sir, it is merely carrying out the designs of annex- 
ing Texas. The object of that act was the same as that of our 
present war. Territorial aggrandizement was the toy held up 
for the North to play with, while the slave-power was fasten- 
ing its coils around us by extending and perpetuating the slave- 
holding interest. Indeed, such was the avowed object of those 
who conceived and urged forward that plan so fatal to the 
honor of our nation. 

That eminent statesman, Henry Clay, foretold the war in 
which we are now engaged with perfect accuracy. He said, in 
his Raleigh letter, that " annexation and war with Mexico are 
identical" He further described the effect, in the manner pro- 
posed, as "fatal to the Union." A distinguished Senator in the 
other end of the capitol, (Mr. Benton,) was so deeply con- 



260 MEXICAN WAR. 

vinced of that result, that he declared the dissolution of the 
Union to have been the object of attempting to annex that part 
of Mexico which lies east and north of the Rio Grande, and 
between that river and Texas proper. 

In March, A. D. 1843, an address to the people of the free 
States, in regard to the annexation of Texas, was published 
throughout the northern portion of the Union. It was signed 
by twenty members of this body, one of whom had been Presi- 
dent of the United States, and four others have sine/3 been 
elected Governors of their respective States. They belonged 
to Maine, Massachusetts, Connecticut, New York, Ohio, and 
Michigan. Speaking of the prospect of annexing Texas, they 
say: 

" We hold that there is not only no political necessity for it, no advantages to 
be derived from it, but that there is no constitutional power delegated to any 
department of the national government to authorize it. That no act of Con- 
gress or treaty for annexation can impose the least obligation upon the several 
States of this Union to submit to such an unwarrantable act, or to receive into 
their family and fraternity such misbegotten and illegitimate progeny. We 
hesitate not to say that annexation, effected by any act or proceeding of the 
Federal Government, or any of its departments, will be identified with dissolu- 
tion. We not only assert that the people of the free States ought not to submit 
to it, but we say with confidence, they will not submit to it." 

The signers of that address regarded the annexation of 
Texas merely as the commencement of a system of territorial 
aggrandizement for the extension of slavery, which was de- 
signed to swallow up and subvert the entire influence of the 
free States. The same idea was expressed in the letter of Mr. 
Clay, to which I have alluded, and has been often repeated on 
this floor. The fact has now become evident. The period is 
near when the people of the northern States will be compelled 
to make an open, undisguised resistance to this system of 
national robbery and extension of slavery, or to surrender all 
pretensions to equal rights with the slave States. There can 
be no evasion of this alternative. 

We may withdraw our army from Mexico, cease to slay 
and murder her people, and desist from the purpose of robbing 
her of her territory ; and yet preserve our country from the 
effects which this policy of extending the slave power must, if 



MEXICAN WAR. 261 

pursued, bring upon us. But our decision must soon be made. 
The representatives of the free States must surrender the 
interests of freedom to the control of those who have recently- 
been, or now are, citizens of foreign governments, or they 
must make an open, frank, and manly resistance to this policy, 
which threatens the overthrow of our liberties. 

The Union formed by our fathers, to which we are all 
attached, has ceased. It no longer protects our interests, our 
rights, or our honor. In saying this, I do but repeat the 
declaration of the legislature of my own State, and those of 
four others ; I merely reiterate the sentiments of those twenty 
members of Congress, whose address I have just alluded to. 
I reiterate the opinions of Henry Clay, of Thomas Jefferson, 
and of many advocates of annexation, who admit there is no 
constitutional power to transfer the people of the free States 
to an association with those of Texas and of Mexico. But it 
is unnecessary to cite these authorities. The Constitution for- 
bids the admission of any member on this floor, until he shall 
have been seven years a citizen of the United States. Here 
are members now present, who, six months since, were citizens 
of a foreign nation, — sworn to support a foreign government. 
They are admitted here by the terms of annexation, in most 
palpable violation of our compact of Union. Nor does it 
require the learning of the jurist, or the study of the states- 
man, to discover that this change of the law-making power is 
an overthrow of the Constitution in its most vital part. It 
having been done without authority, constitutes it a revolution. 
What I mean by revolution is, an unauthorized change of the 
essential elements of government, — whether such change be 
effected by violence and bloodshed, or by peaceful measures. 
The revolution in France consisted in the change of govern- 
ment from a monarchy to that of a republic. The anarchy 
and bloodshed with which it was attended, resulted from the 
change of government, or from the efforts put forth to effect 
that change ; but they constituted no inherent part of the revo- 
lution itself. Had there been no resistance, no bloodshed ; had 
the change been quietly submitted to, the revolution would 



262 MEXICAN WAR. 

have been the same; the monarchy would have been over- 
thrown, and the republic would have been established. So in 
this revolution. If the people of the several States submit 
quietly to the overthrow of the old Union of 1787, and silently 
come into the new Union, with Texas and other new slave 
States, the change of the Constitution and of the Union will 
be the same as though it were attended with violence and 
bloodshed. And such change of the government, and of the 
parties to our Union, will be as really a revolution as it would 
be if the people of the States were forced into it by the mur- 
der of one half of their number. I therefore characterize this 
change of government a revolution. By what authority has 
this change been effected ? 

The great and leading maxim in all monarchies is, that the 
monarch is the source of all power. The fundamental maxim 
in our government is, that " the people are the source and 
fountain of all political power." Our State constitutions have 
been formed by the people of the several States. They have 
either adopted their State constitution by their own direct vote, 
or by the vote of their agents appointed for that express pur- 
pose. In most of those constitutions they have declared that 
" all powers not delegated by such constitution remain with the 
people." In the amendments to our Federal Constitution it is 
declared, that " all powers not thereby delegated are reserved 
to the States respectively, or to the people." Hence the 
emphatic language by which it was proclaimed, that " we the 
people of the United States do ordain and establish this Con- 
stitution," etc. 

Now, Sir, it is surely unnecessary to show by argument that 
the Constitution, thus adopted by the people of the several 
States, cannot be changed in its fundamental principles by us, 
who were sent here merely to legislate under its existing pro- 
visions. We were not elected for that purpose ; no powers 
were delegated to us thus to change the fundamental law ; the 
exercise of such powers will be a usurpation of authority. 
The constables or sheriffs of the several States possess as much 
right, and as much constitutional power to meet and admit for- 



MEXICAN WAR. 263 

eign nations to our Union, as we do. Their acts on this sub- 
ject would be as binding upon the people of the several States 
as ours. On this point, I think there is a very general coinci- 
dence of opinion among reflecting men. 

All, or nearly all, believe that the resolutions annexing 
Texas imposed no obligations upon the people of any State to 
unite with her. I believe the sentiments expressed by the 
members of this House, in the address to which I have re- 
ferred, met with very general approbation among both political 
parties at the North. I then regarded the views expressed in 
it as correct, and I still think so. Those gentlemen looked 
upon the annexation of Texas as itself a dissolution of the 
Union. They regarded the subjecting the people of the several 
States to the legislation of foreigners, a total change or over- 
throw of one of the fundamental elements of the government. 
It is true that the passing of the resolutions of annexation was 
of itself void. They had no legal or constitutional effect what- 
ever. They neither rendered the admission of the Texan 
representatives into this body legal or illegal, constitutional or 
unconstitutional. Those resolutions might have remained upon 
our statute book forever inoperative, and no one would have 
had just cause of complaint. It is the uniting of, at least, a 
portion of the States with Texas in the exercise of that most 
important act of sovereignty, legislation, and other govern- 
mental powers, which constitutes the real overthrow of the 
Constitution. Sir, if Congress could thus place a portion of its 
sovereign power in the hands of Texas, it could have placed 
the whole legislation of the nation at their disposal. It is a 
question of principle, and not of degree. 

But it is said that by continuing to elect members of Con- 
gress to serve in this hall, with those from Texas, and by unit- 
ing with her in the election of President, the several States 
will give their tacit consent to the change of the Constitution, 
and to the change of parties to the Union, and will lose their 
right to dissent. I believe this doctrine to be correct. It is 
the only ground on which Louisiana can now claim to be a 
party to the Union. 



264 MEXICAN WAR. 

This, Sir, is the situation into which this policy has brought 
us. It has thus broken up the Union of our fathers. It has 
left each State at liberty to continue its association with the 
others who belonged to our Union, or to refuse farther political 
connection with them. I will not predict the future action of 
the several States. They will probably continue as they now 
are ; but the prestige of our Union has departed. We have 
abandoned the policy of peace, the encouragement of industry, 
the development of our resources, that adherence to public, to 
national morality, which alone can secure the respect of our- 
selves or of the Christian world. We have entered upon a 
career of conquest, of military force, which has proven the 
grave of all those republics that have gone before us. If we 
continue in this course, their fate will be ours. The same God 
who measured out their retributive justice still rules and reigns. 
His arm is not shortened, nor his laws changed. The penalty 
which He visited upon them must fall upon us, if we continue 
the policy in which we are now engaged. 



THE PRESIDENT'S ANNUAL MESSAGE. 



ITS SOPHISTRY — ITS MISREPRESENTATIONS — ITS CONTRADICTIONS — NA- 
TIONAL PROSPERITY CHANGED TO A STATE OF WAR — CHARACTER OF 
THE WAR — OPPOSITION TO IT VINDICATED — WITHDRAWAL OF THE 
ARMY AND TENDER OF PEACE ADVOCATED. 

[War had been declared in May, and its advocates, including the President, 
had used all their influence to induce a belief among the people that it was just, 
and a war of defence. The following speech was intended to show its real 

', character, and to expose the devices of the President in attempting to disguise 

I its real character.] 

Mr. Chairman, — When we met in this hall, in December, 
1844, our country was at peace with the whole world. Our 
agricultural, our manufacturing, and our commercial interests 
were in a state of unusual prosperity. The circulating medium 
■ of the nation was actively employed in the legitimate business 
I of the country. Industry, in all its departments, yielded to the 
] laborer a satisfactory compensation ; and prosperity and con- 
tentment prevailed throughout the land. Unfortunately, an 
inordinate desire for territorial aggrandizement had seized 
upon one of our great political parties. It was opposed by the 
other with much zeal and ability. They foretold this war as a 
consequence of the annexation of Texas, and pointed out the 
present circumstances of our country, with almost as much pre- 
cision as the pen of the historian can now record them. These 
| predictions, however, were disregarded ; and, in the short 

* Speech on the resolutions to refer the President's Message. Delivered in 
Committee of the Whole House on the state of the Union, December 15, 1846. 
23 



266 the president's annual message. 

space of two years, we find ourselves involved in a bloody and 
expensive war, with a large national debt already accumulated, 
and by the message before us proposed to be increased more 
than twenty millions of dollars at the present session. That 
debt is to rest like an incubus upon us and upon our children 
in coming years. 

Sir, we have been hurried from a state of peace and prosper- 
ity to our present condition by that policy which through all 
past time has proven fatal to every popular government that 
has adopted it. No man who consults the past history of our 
race, and calmly views our present condition, can doubt that 
this policy of territorial aggrandizement must, if continued, 
result in the overthrow of this government. Had we remained 
satisfied with our territory as it was two years since, this war, 
with its vast debt, its thousands of human victims; its bloodshed, 
its crimes, and its disgrace would have been avoided. Let the 
President fill his annual messages with arguments endeavoring 
to cast the odium of this war on Mexico ; let him and his cab- 
inet do all in their power to excuse themselves, or to extenuate 
their own conduct ; still every intelligent man in the nation 
must be fully conscious that the annexation of Texas has 
involved us in this war; and the country, and the civilized 
world, will hold the advocates of that measure responsible for 
all the crimes, the misery, and suffering which have, or which 
shall 'hereafter result from it. This war has become the sub- 
ject of inquiry and discussion throughout the country. It is 
the absorbing topic in our social circles, in stage coaches, in 
railroad cars, and in steamboats ; in our pulpits and religious 
meetings ; in our political conventions, our State legislatures ; 
in Congress, and in the Executive cabinet. It is discussed in 
the United States, in Mexico, and in Europe. 

The people of the nation are demanding of the Executive a 
statement of the objects of this war. What are the ulterior 
designs of the government in its prosecution ? Why are the 
people to be taxed to an indefinite amount for the support of an 
army occupied in carrying bloodshed and suffering to the heart 
of a sister Kepublic ? What good are we, or the country, or 



THE PRESIDENT'S ANNUAL MESSAGE. 267 

posterity, to derive from this vast expenditure of blood and 
treasure on Mexican soil? What great and transcendant 
advantage is the human family to receive from the slaughter 
of our Mexican brethren, or from the death of our sons, our 
brothers, and friends, who fall by the sword or by disease in 
that pestilential climate ? The public mind demands categori- 
gal answers to these interrogatories, but the Executive has 
evaded them all. He returns for answer, in substance, that 
those who speak their honest sentiments in regard to this war, 
" lend aid and comfort to the enemy," and are, therefore, guilty 
of moral treason. 

This undignified attack upon the freedom of speech must 
call forth an indignant rebuke from every friend of popular 
rights. It is at war with the first principles of a free govern- 
ment. It is unprecedented in the history of this nation. It 
can find no sanction, except in the despotisms of a darker age. 
I It will meet with encouragement only from tyrants or usurpers, 
| and will be quietly submitted to by none but the miserable 
sycophants of licentious power. 

On looking over the message, the reader is at once struck 

i with its defensive character. No person can read it without 

. being conscious that the author felt the pressure of public sen- 

I timent, and was endeavoring to avoid public disapprobation. 

Indeed, had he been arraigned before the Senate on articles of 

] impeachment, I think his defence would have embraced the 

I leading features of this message. I should have expected the 

same sophistry and misrepresentation which characterize the 

l communication now before us. It is mortifying to me, as an 

I American citizen, to be compelled to use such language in 

J reference to the message of the Chief Magistrate of our nation. 

But milder terms would not do justice to its contradictions or 

its perversions of truth. And the attempt on the part of the 

President to stifle debate in this hall, by declaring all to be 

j traitors who oppose this war, demands of us an unrestrained 

expression of our honest sentiments. 

I wish, however, at this time, to call the attention of the 
House and of the country to that paragraph in which he says : 



268 the president's annual message. 

" The existing war with Mexico was neither desired nor provoked by the 
United States. On the contrary, all honorable means were resorted to to avert 
it. After years of endurance of aggravated and unredressed wrongs on our part, 
Mexico, in violation of solemn treaty stipulations, and of every principle of jus- 
tice recognized by civilized nations, commenced hostilities ; and thus, by her 
own act, forced the war upon us." 

This is an important assertion; and, if founded on truth, 
shows us engaged in a defensive war ; we should, therefore, 
compare it with established facts, and ascertain if it be correct. 
We all are satisfied that no hostilities had taken place up to 
the time that our army left Corpus Christi and advanced to the 
Rio Grande. General Taylor, in his reports to the War 
Department, mentions no act of hostility on the part of Mexico 
until the 23d April last. He had, before that time, taken pos- 
session of " Brasos Santiago," where the Mexicans had estab- 
lished and long maintained a custom-house, at which our citi- 
zens had paid duties on all merchandise landed there, up to the 
very day that our troops took possession of it, and drove the 
Mexicans from it. With his army, General Taylor entered a 
country settled by Mexicans, where none but Mexican laws 
had ever been observed, and whose people had ever lived 
under the protection of the Mexican Government, to which 
they had always yielded a willing and patriotic support. They 
fled with their families at the approach of our army, who took 
possession of their fields and occupied their dwellings. Gene- 
ral Taylor erected a battery, and mounted his cannon in such a 
position as to command the city of Matamoras. On the 6th of 
April, 1846, he wrote the Adjutant- General as follows : 

" On our side, a battery for four eighteen-pounders will be completed, and the 
guns placed in battery to-day. These guns bear directly upon the public square 
of Matamoras, and within good range for demolishing the town." 

Yet the President assures us that the " war was not pro- 
voked" by the United States. 

On the 15 th April, General Taylor informed the Depart- 
ment by letter, that " no hostile movement had then been made 
by the Mexicans." In the same letter he says : 

" I considered the letter of General Ampudia sufficient to wan-ant me in 
blocking up the Rio Grande, and stopping all supplies for Matamoras." 



THE PRESIDENT'S ANNUAL MESSAGE. 269 

Now, Sir, I have no hesitation in saying, there is not a civil- 
ized nation upon earth that would not have regarded these acts 
of our army, if done towards them, not merely as 'provoking war, 
but as actual ivar. 

The next letter of General Taylor bears date 23d April, 
1846, in which he says : 

" With a view to check the depredations of small parties of Mexicans on this 
side of the river, Lieutenants Dobbin, third infantry, and Porter, of the fourth 
infantiy, were authorized by me, a few days since, to scour the country for 
some miles, with a select party of men, and capture or destroy any such parties 
as they might meet. It appears that they separated, and that Lieutenant Por- 
ter, at the head of his own detachment, surprised a Mexican camp, drove away 
the men, and took possession of their horses." 

This was, I believe, the first hostile meeting of the military 
forces of the two governments. 

The President says, Mexico " commenced hostilities ; " Gen- 
eral Taylor says that, by his order, " Lieutenant Porter sur- 
prised a Mexican camp, drove away the men, and took posses- 
sion of their horses." I think no man will doubt that these 
acts of our troops were hostile acts. Yet we have, in this same 
letter of General Taylor, the official declaration that, " notwith- 
standing the alternative of war, presented by General Ampu- 
dia, no hostile movement had yet been made by his force." 
Now does General Taylor tell truth ? If so, the President's 
assertion must be untrue, and those who confide in its accuracy 
will be deceived. 

On the 26th April, General Taylor again writes: 

" I regret to report, that a party of dragoons, sent out by me on the 24th 
instant, to watch the course of the river above on this bank, became engaged 
with a very large force of the enemy, and, after a short affair, in which some 
sixteen were kiUed and wounded, appear to have been surrounded, and com- 
pelled to surrender." 

He further adds : " Hostilities may now be considered as 
commenced." For thus attacking a superior force of Mexicans 
without orders, we are informed that Captain Thornton, who 
commanded the dragoons, was arrested, and tried by a court- 
martial ; and the record of that proceeding may now be found 
in the "War Department. Thus it appears, most conclusively, 
23* 



270 the president's annual message. , 

that the assertions of the President that "the war was not 
provoked by the United States," and that " Mexico commenced 
hostilities," are unfounded and untrue. Sir, I feel that the 
duty of exposing these misrepresentations of the Executive is 
unpleasant, but it is nevertheless imperative. 

In order to sustain his important assertions, the Executive 
enters upon a most extraordinary argument to show that the 
" Rio Grande " is the true western boundary of Texas. But, 
before I proceed to expose the sophistry of that argument, and 
the further misrepresentation of facts connected with it, I will 
call the attention of the House to the geographical situation of 
the country, and to the location of the settlements " between 
the Nueces and the Rio Grande." At Corpus Christi, being 
on the west side of the mouth of the Nueces, is a settlement 
and a Texian custom-house. As you ascend that river, you 
find within its immediate valley occasional settlements ; and, 
although the original line between Texas and Coahuila was 
established upon the river Aransas, being some forty miles 
east of this valley, yet the people on the Nueces united in the 
Texian revolt, and were associated with those of Texas in 
forming their government. It may therefore be said, that 
Texas extended her conquests so far as to include these settle- 
ments on the Nueces. 

Proceeding west of this valley, you enter a barren desert of 
at least a hundred miles in width, on which there is no human 
habitation. Leaving this desert, and descending into the val- 
ley of the Rio Grande, you come to the Mexican settlements. 
Immediately on the coast, and some miles east of the mouth of 
the Rio Grande is the post of " Brasos Santiago," at which 
there was a Mexican custom-house and settlement ; and, as you 
ascend the river for two thousand miles, you find plantations, 
towns, villages, and cities, composed of persons born under 
Mexican laws, and who have always lent a willing and unfal- 
tering support to that government. These settlements com- 
pose a part of four Mexican States. Tamaulipas lies upon the 
Gulf, and formerly extended across the Nueces to the Aransas ; 
but, as before stated, the settlements in the valley of the Nue- 



THE PRESIDENT'S ANNUAL MESSAGE. 271 

ces united with Texas, and, therefore, her present eastern 
boundary may be said to be on the desert heretofore described. 
Ascending the Rio Grande, you pass from Tamaulipas into 
Coahuila, then Chihuahua, and then into New Mexico. " Santa 
Fe," the capital of the -last named State, being situated some 
thirty miles east of the Rio Grande, which the President rep- 
resents as the western boundary of Texas. 

I must pass over some of the arguments of the President, 
used to establish the Rio Grande as the boundary of Texas. 
They have been so often refuted, that I should trespass too far 
upon the patience of the House, were I to occupy time in 
exposing their fallacy ; still the President seems to think that 
repetition will give them the force of truth. The pretence set 
up that we had title to the whole country east of the Rio 
Grande, prior to our treaty with Spain in 1819, by which we 
released all claim to it, can have no possible bearing upon the 
boundaries of Texas, which were defined by legislative act in 
1834. By the treaty with Spain, we surrendered to her all 
claim to the territory west of the Sabine ; and she released all 
claim to her territory east of that river, including Florida. 
Now, if that treaty be valid, then we have no possible claim to 
any portion of the country west of the Sabine. If it be void, 
then Spain has a just title to Florida. The argument is too 
absurd for serious refutation, yet it is brought forward for some 
purpose. 

But the President, speaking of the Rio Grande, says : 

" The Republic of Texas always claimed this river as her western boundary, 
and, in her treaty made with Santa Anna, in May, 1836, he recognized it as 
such." 

Gentlemen should understand that the republic of Texas did 
not exist until she declared her independence ; prior to that 
time, it was the department of Texas. When, therefore, the 
President says, " the Republic of Texas always claimed this 
river as her western boundary," he means merely that it has 
been so claimed since the republic of Texas has existed, that is, 
since 1836. I will not charge him with an intention to deceive 
by the use of such language. 



272 THE president's annual message. 

As to the treaty with Santa Anna, I only wish to say, that 
any agreement or compact may be called a treaty, whether 
made between individuals or governments. It is in this view 
of language that the President speaks of the agreement with 
Santa Anna as a treaty. It was merely a personal undertaking 
of his own. He did not profess to act for the Mexican people, 
or for the government of Mexico. In consideration that he 
should be liberated and sent to Mexico in a government ship, 
he undertook to use his influence with his government to 
obtain an acknowledgment of the independence of Texas, with 
the Rio Grande as its boundary. The compact was never 
observed by Texas herself. General Lamar, her President, 
declared it void, and no individual of either of those govern- 
ments, so far as I am informed, ever regarded it, as in any re- 
spect, binding upon Mexico. But it is now seized upon by the 
President, and by a course of sophistical reasoning, used to give 
color to the claim of Texas over the country east of the Rio 
Grande. 

It is clear to the view of every man, that Texas must have 
acquired her title, if she had any to the territory in the valley 
of the Rio Grande, either by treaty or by conquest. She had 
no other mode of obtaining it. Neither the President nor his 
friends dare come to the point and assert, that Texas ever held 
it, or even claimed it by treaty or by conquest. Yet the 
President, in this message, attempts to show, by circumlocution 
and sophistry, what he dare not assert in direct terms. 

Thus he goes on to say : 

" By the Constitution which Texas adopted in March, 1836, senatorial and 
representative districts were organized extending west of the Nueces." 

True, her senatorial and representative districts did extend 
" west of the Nueces," so far as to include the settlements 
situated on its banks and in the valley of that stream. But 
did he intend to have the American people understand that 
they extended across the desert to the Rio Grande ? If so, he 
must have intended to deceive them by making them believe 
what he dare not assert. He says further : 



THE PRESIDENT'S ANNUAL MESSAGE. 273 

" The Congress of Texas, on the 19th of December, 1836, passed 'an act to 
define the boundaries of the republic of Texas,' in which they declared the 
Rio Grande, from its mouth to its source, to be their boundary, and by the 
said act, they extended their ' civil and political jurisdiction ' over the coun- 
try up to that boundary." 

Yes, they declared " the Rio Grande from its mouth to its 
source their boundary ; " the Mexican post and custom-house 
at Brazos Santiago, and all the Mexican settlements, towns, 
and villages, on the east side of that river, with the city of 
" Santa Fe," all, on paper, were declared to he within the 
republic of Texas. And the President adds, " and by said 
act " they extended their civil and political jurisdiction over 
the country up to that boundary. It was done " by said act, " 
and not otherwise. It was not done by treaty, nor by force of 
arms. It was printed on paper, and that was the only mode 
in which Texas ever extended her jurisdiction over the Mexi- 
cans in the valley of the Rio Grande. She never sent an 
officer west of the desert to serve process, or to collect taxes, 
or to execute Texian laws. "When she sent her troops there 
for the purposes of conquest, every man was killed or captured, 
or driven back across the desert. Yet the Executive evident- 
ly intended that the people should understand from this soph- 
istry, that the Rio Grande was really the western boundary of 
Texas, and that she had asserted and actually maintained her 
jurisdiction over the people living in the valley of that stream. 
He dared not make such an assertion in plain and direct lan- 
guage. No friend of his on this floor has ever dared, or ever 
will dare, to make such an assertion. It would ruin the char- 
acter of any man for veracity who should hazard such a dec- 
laration. Yet we see such undignified sophistication sent forth 
to the people by the Executive of the nation to induce them to 
believe what he dare not declare. But we have still more 
argument of the same character. He says : 

" During a period of more than nine years, which intervened between the 
adoption of her Constitution and her annexation as one of the States of our 
Union, Texas asserted and exercised many acts of sovereignty and jurisdic- 
tion over the territory and inhabitants west of the Nueces." 

Yes, she served process and collected taxes on the west bank 



274 the president's annual message. 

of the Nueces. Perhaps she punished crimes committed there 
by people who acknowledged her jurisdiction. But no such 
act was done within a hundred miles of the Mexicans in the 
valley of the Rio Grande. 

Among them property was protected, crimes punished, and 
the people governed by Mexican laws ; and such had been the 
case, not merely for nine years, but from the first existence of 
the Mexican government without interruption. But the Presi- 
dent continues : 

" She organized and defined the limits of counties extending to the Eio 
Grande. She established courts of justice, and extended her judicial system 
over the territory." 

It is true, that on paper, she defined the Eio Grande as the 
limits of her counties. But did she ever maintain her jurisdic- 
tion ? Did she enforce her laws in the valley of that river ? Did 
she indict, arraign, or punish those who shot down her troops 
when sent there ? Did any Mexican ever take the oath of 
allegiance to Texas ? Did any Texian officer ever venture to 
arrest a man in that valley, or even to go there ? Her judicial 
system was extended over that territory on paper y but not by 
Texian arms. He adds : 

" She established a custom-house, and collected duties, and also post ofhces 
and post roads in it." 

I remarked some time since that Texas had established 
a custom-house at " Corpus Christi," on the west bank of the 
Nueces. That is conclusive evidence that she held actual 
possession of that part of the country. And so is the main- 
tenance of a custom-house by the Mexicans at " Point Isabel," 
and another at Taos, east of Santa Fe, conclusive evidence 
that Mexico held possession of those parts of the country. 
And if Mexico in a time of peace had sent troops and taken 
possession of the custom-house at Corpus Christi, it would 
have been a hostile act. It would have been an act of war. 
So, on the other hand, for the President to send a military 
force to take possession of the custom-house at " Point Isabel" 
was a hostile act. It constituted actual war. 

The President goes on, with the same specious misrepresen- 



THE PRESIDENT'S ANNUAL MESSAGE. 275 

tation of facts, to say, that " Texas made grants of land west 
of the Nueces ; " that " a senator and representative in the 
Texian Congress resided west of the Nueces," etc. To all 
which I will only answer, that so far as they represent the 
jurisdiction of Texas to Jiave extended over the people in the 
valley of the Nueces, and east of the desert, they may be true. 
But, if understood as saying that Texas ever exercised actual 
jurisdiction over any portion of the people west of the desert, 
in the valley of the Rio Grande, then are they unfounded and 
untrue. Sir, I repeat, that Texas could have obtained title to 
the country in the valley of the Rio Grande only by treaty or 
by conquest. It being occupied by Mexican settlements, there 
never was, and never will be, any other mode in which Texas 
or the United States can obtain title to it. No man pretends 
that Texas ever held or claimed it by treaty. 

It therefore follows, that she must have held it by conquest, 
or she had no title to it whatever. The President dared not 
say, in definite language, that Texas had conquered it. The 
historical information of the country would instantly have 
declared such an assertion untrue. No friend of the President 
in this hall will dare hazard his reputation for truth by putting 
forth such a declaration. They will rely upon sophistry, upon 
specious circumlocution, and misrepresentation. They cannot 
be brought to any definite point. They will rely upon the 
popular credulity, and not upon the intelligence of the people. 
Time must demonstrate the success or failure of the experi- 
ment. It is an old saying, that "Truth is always con- 
sistent with itself." And we may, with equal propriety, say, 
that falsehood is always opposed to truth. So with this 
message ; its important points are in direct conflict. We are 
all aware that " Fanta Fe," the capital of New Mexico, is 
some thirty miles east of the Rio Grande. Now, if the pre- 
tences of the President be true, that Texas is bounded on that 
river, " from its mouth to its source," the city of " Santa Fe* " 
is within the jurisdiction of Texas, governed and controlled by 
Texian laws. But the President, in the latter part of the 



276 THE president's annual message. 

message, while speaking of the army, and desiring to blazon 
forth the glory of our conquests, says : 

" The privations of long marches through the enemy's country, and through 
a wilderness, have been borne without a murmur. By rapid movements the 
province of New Mexico, with Santa Fe, its capital, has been captured without 
bloodshed." 

Thus, after a long and tedious argument to convince us that 
Texas is, in truth, bounded by the Rio Grande ; that she had 
extended her jurisdiction to that river ; that her laws were in 
force over the whole territory east of it, he comes out, and dis- 
tinctly admits that the department of " New Mexico " extends 
far on this side of that river ; that " Santa Fe," situated thirty 
miles east of it, is, in truth, the capital of one of the Mexican 
States ; and, of course, that it is not, and never was, included 
within the bounds of Texas. Instead of submitting to Texian 
laws, he declares it to have been " conquered by our army." 
And he informs us, that the commander of our army there has 
established a civil government over the people of that State. 
Now these two portions of the message are in direct conflict 
with each other. They cannot both be true. One of them 
must, of necessity, be entirely unfounded. And I would 
solemnly ask, which are the people to receive as true, and 
which are they to discard as untrue ? For the purpose of 
justifying himself in sending our troops to the " Rio Grande," 
and commencing hostilities there, he declares " Santa Fe " to be 
in Texas. But, in order to show the conquests of our army, he 
declares it to be the capital of one of the departments of Mexico. 
Now a contradiction so palpable, and at the same time so 
important, would have done no credit to the merest tyro of a 
county court. Still here it is, in the presidental message, sent 
forth to the people, and to the world. 

.My colleague (Mr. Schenck) the other day extorted from a 
distinguished friend of the President on this floor the admis- 
sion, that he never believed that Texas included " Santa Fe." 
The admission concedes the fallacy of the whole argument of 
the President in regard to the boundary of Texas. 



THE PRESIDENT'S ANNUAL MESSAGE. 277 

Mr. Pillsbury, of Texas, said he had made no such admis- 
sion. 

Mr. Giddings replied : I did not allude to the member from 
Texas. I referred to the gentleman on his right from Tennes- 
see, (Mr. Stanton). But I will now inquire of the member 
from Texas, whether " Santa Fe," be in truth the capital of 
" New Mexico," as asserted in the latter part of the message ? 
or is it within the boundaries of Texas, as asserted in the fore 
part of that document ? Sir, on which horn of the dilemma 
will the gentleman place the President? If the gentleman 
from Texas refuses to answer my interrogatory, I call on any 
personal or political friend of the Executive to answer this 
plain and simple question. If any member will do me and the 
country the favor to answer it, I will gladly yield the floor for 
that purpose ; and I now pause for a reply. 

[Here Mr. G. having paused for some time, and no member 
rising, resumed] : 

Mr. Chairman, — The President has many able and warm 
friends on this floor ; but no one steps forth to extricate him 
from this attitude in which he has placed himself. Sir, " out of 
his own mouth is he condemned" He has himself placed the 
evidence of his misrepresentation on the records of the nation. 
It will go into the archives of the government, and will descend 
to posterity a perpetual proof of the weakness and wickedness 
of this administration. It is a humiliating duty thus to expose 
the uncandid arguments and assertions of the Executive ; but 
a due regard to the cause of truth, devotion to the principles of 
immutable justice, demand a faithful examination of this very 
extraordinary document ; and I only regret that the duty has 
not fallen upon one more able to do it justice. 

Before I leave this part of the subject I wish to say, that 
this admission of the President, that " New Mexico " extends 
this side of the Rio Grande according to its former limits, is a 
surrender of the whole argument that Texas is bounded by 
that river. The President defines the boundary to be " the 
Rio Grande from its mouth to its source" But by admitting 
that " New Mexico " still includes " Santa FeV' he admits that 
24 



278 the president's annual message. 

the line of Texas extends no farther west than she has carried 
her conquests, and maintained and enforced her laws. That is 
the correct rule of international law, and it applies to Tamauli- 
pas as well as to New Mexico ; to " Brazos Santiago " as well 
as to " Santa Fe." 

The President admits, indeed he says expressly, that our 
army has conquered " Santa Fe." He says so, for the reason 
that Mexican laws ever had been and continued to be in force 
there, and Mexican officers commanded them up to the time 
that our troops arrived and took control of the country. Such 
was precisely the state of facts in relation to " Brasos Santi- 
ago," at " Fort Brown," and through the whole valley of the 
" Rio Grande." The custom-house at " Point Isabel," was in 
the care and under the control of Mexican officers, and had 
been from the day of its establishment ; and the people there 
were governed by Mexican laws, and yielded obedience to the 
Mexican government, up to the time of General Taylor's arri- 
val, precisely as they did at "Santa Fe," up to the arrival of 
General Kearney. " Point Isabel," and that portion of the 
State»of Tamaulipas which lies between the Rio Grande and 
the desert, was captured by General Taylor, precisely as New 
Mexico and " Santa Fe " were captured by General Kearney. 
The only distinction in the two cases is, that one was invaded 
and captured in a time of peace, and the other in a time of 
war. 

Another feature of this message, is the general representa- 
tion that this war is defensive on our part. But here again 
the President has recourse to vague sophistry. He does not 
inform us what portion of our territory was invaded or threat- 
ened with invasion. Who, Sir, of all the people of these 
United States, ever dreamed themselves in danger of Mexican 
violence ? 

Why, Sir, in a time of profound peace, our army, by order 
of the President, left Corpus Christ!, and crossing the desert, 
proceeded more than a hundred miles beyond the farthest 
limits of Texas and of Texian laws, and entering upon terri- 
tory which had ever been in the possession of Mexico, they 



THE PRESIDENT'S ANNUAL MESSAGE. 279 

eized upon the custom-house at " Point Isabel," blockaded the 
^io Grande, erected a fortification, and mounted cannon, so as 
o command Matamoras, surprised a military encampment of 
Mexicans, drove away the men, and took possession of their 
lorses ; and, finally, our dragoons charged upon their infantry, 
>efore the Mexicans fired a gun. And now the Executive 
epresents this as a defensive war ! 

Our army has crossed the Rio Grande, taken Matamoras, 
Damargo, Monterey, Saltillo, Tobasco, Tampico, Sante Fe, and 
he whole of California. We have penetrated to the very 
leart of Mexico. We have stormed their strong fortresses, 
>ombarded their cities, and involved defenceless women, help- 
ess children, and decrepid age, in scenes of human butchery, 
md now profess that we are acting in defence of our own peo- 
)le. What estimate must the author of this message have 
)laced upon the intelligence of this body, and of the nation, 
vhen he penned these statements ? Such absurdities defy 
irgument. 

But the President complains that Mexico long since seized 
he property of our citizens, for which they failed to make 
compensation, agreeably to treaty stipulations. Much of the 
nessage is occupied in calling the attention of the country to 
hese wrongs. It is undoubtedly true, that some of our citi- 
zens, residing in Mexico during their revolution, were unlaw- 
fully deprived of their property. But it is equally true, that 
hose difficulties were subsequently adjusted by treaty, and 
Mexico agreed to pay us the amount of loss sustained. 

The three first instalments were paid according to stipula- 
tion ; but, like our repudiating States, she was unable to meet 
ill of her pecuniary engagements. Now all we have to com- 
3lain of is, her failure to pay over the money as she had 
igreed. The wrongs and injuries committed upon our people 
lad been arranged. They were merged in the treaty of amity 
md friendship, by which all past injuries were mutually for- 
given. Had Mexico observed the treaty, we could not have 
complained ; having broken it, our complaint, and only legiti- 
mate complaint, is on account of such breach. That breach 



280 the president's annual message. 

consists in not paying the money at the time stipulated. For 
that we have no more cause of war than England had against 
Pennsylvania, or Illinois, or Arkansas, or Mississippi, for not 
paying their debts. But I deny that the failure of a govern- 
ment to meet its pecuniary obligations is good cause for shoot- 
ing her soldiers and butchering her people. Surely, we should 
be the last nation in the world to put forth this doctrine of the 
President. But Mexico was exerting herself to meet her 
engagements up to the very time of our commencing hostili- 
ties. Not so with some of our repudiating States. They deny 
all moral obligations to pay. There is, therefore, more cause 
for murdering the people of those States, than we have to 
destroy those of Mexico. 

But, Sir, what is the amount of money thus due to our peo- 
ple, for the recovery of which the President represents this 
war to have been commenced and carried on ? I believe it is 
less than three millions of dollars. We have already expended 
more than thirty millions in this war ; and, by this message, 
we are asked to appropriate twenty millions more. This vast 
expenditure is said to have been made with a view to extort 
three millions from Mexico. But this fifty millions is but a 
part of the pecuniary loss which the nation must suffer. The 
time of every man engaged in this war is lost, yea, worse than 
lost. The amount of injury to our commerce, and to the busi- 
ness of the country, by diverting the circulating medium from 
its legitimate channels, cannot be estimated. But the whole 
pecuniary damage constitutes but a small portion of our real 
loss. The effect which this war is destined to exert upon the 
morals of our people is far more to be deplored than its effect 
upon property. 

Again : How can we estimate the anguish and suffering of 
our sick and wounded and dying soldiers ? How shall we com- 
pute their agony and despair. Go, count the graves of those 
whose lives have been sacrificed to recover this three million 
dollars. Then number the widows and the orphans, and ascer- 
tain their griefs, their poverty, their disappointed hopes and 
blighted expectations. Add these to the whole loss and suffer- 



THE PRESIDENT'S ANNUAL MESSAGE. 281 

ing which this war has brought upon our land. Then proceed 
to Mexico ; form a catalogue of the crimes committed there by 
our troops, and ascertain the amount of pecuniary, physical, 
and mental suffering inflicted upon her people. Find the sum 
total, and compare it-with the three millions of dollars for 
which we are contending ; strike the balance, and then judge 
of the policy and humanity of this war, and of those who sus- 
tain it. 

Sir, the Executive never assigned the non-payment of this 
money as a cause of war, until after hostilities were com- 
menced. Our troops had invaded Mexico. The battles of 
" Palo Alto " and " Resaca de la Palma " had been fought, 
before this reason for commencing the war appears to have 
been discovered. It did not, therefore, operate to bring on the 
war. It was an after-thought, subsequently brought forth to 
justify it. But here, again, the different parts of the message 
do not sustain each other. In the forepart of that document 
the author says, " Mexico commenced hostilities" and, in the 
latter part, he goes into a long argument to show that we had 
good cause for commencing the war, and tacitly admits that we 
did, in fact, commence it. But I have only time to touch upon 
some of the interesting points, these inconsistencies, these con- 
tradictions of the message. I have no opportunity, under this 
hour rule, to go into detail. 

I have stated the amount of moneys already expended, and 
now asked for carrying on this war. The President avows his 
intention to hold the territory which we have conquered, until 
Mexico shall repay us this expenditure. We have waged an 
unnecessary and unjust war upon a weak and defenceless 
republic. We have squandered untold millions in its prosecur 
tion ; and now the President expresses his intention to rob 
Mexico of her territory, unless she repays the money we have 
so profusely spent. This we all know she can never do. The 
avowal, therefore, amounts to a declaration of the President's 
intention to render it a war of conquest. Indeed, we have 
abundant evidence of such intention. 

During the darker ages, and among savage nations, such a 
24* 



282 the president's annual message. 

war might have been tolerated; but it will surely be con- 
demned by all Christian nations of the nineteenth century. 
Such a war is opposed to the sentiment of the age in which we 
live. Sir, I would as soon lend my vote to commence a system 
of national robbery or piracy, as I would to support a war 
commenced for the evident purpose of wresting from a neigh- 
boring government a portion of her territory. But how much 
Mexican territory does the President think it will require to 
indemnify us for our expenditure ? How much land will he 
demand for the thousands of American citizens whose lives 
have been sacrificed in this war ? 

Again, Sir, is the President and his friends conscious that 
the public lands in the slave States have never paid the ex- 
penses of surveying and selling them ? They have cost us 
forty millions of dollars more than we have been able to sell 
them for. Every acre has been an expense to us. Nearly the 
entire profits arising from the sale of lands in the free States, 
has been expended to supply the expense of those in the slave 
States. Such will be the case with those acquired in Mexico. 
The more territory we get there, the greater will be the loss. 
A standing army must be maintained, to hold the people in 
subjection to our laws. With the expenses of the lands and 
maintenance of an army, burdens will be incurred that are to 
sit heavily upon the nation for coming generations. And the 
more territory we get, the greater will be the expense. Under 
these circumstances, I leave it for the supporters of this war 
to determine upon the amount of territory it will require to 
satisfy us for the money we have paid out for its support.* 

But, Sir, this is an Executive war. It was commenced by 
his orders. He directed our army to leave " Corpus Christi," 
to enter the Mexican settlements, and to take a position upon 
the " Rio Grande," without advising with Congress. It was 
under his orders that the battles of " Palo Alto " and " Resaca 
de la Palma " were fought. The lamented Ringgold, and those 

* Such was the expense of maintaining the government in New Mexico, that, 
in 1852, the Secretary of the Interior recommended giving it up and with- 
drawing our army therefrom. 



THE PRESIDENT'S ANNUAL MESSAGE. 283 

who fell with him in those sanguinary conflicts, together with 
those who bled at Fort Brown, were victims to his unhallowed 
ambition. For their loss, he is responsible at the bar of public 
opinion. Before the people of this nation, I charge him with 
their murder. The imprecations of those who were there 
rendered widows, and of those made orphans, and of those who 
were there rendered childless, must in coming time rest on 
him ; and, in the day of final retribution, the blood of our 
slaughtered countrymen will be required at his hands. In that 
dread responsibility, I will take no share. Against this war, 
in all its forms, I ever have, and ever shall, put forth my hum- 
ble, but my earnest protest. 

A few days since, a political friend of the President in 
debate on this floor, complained that the religious sentiment of 
the nation had been invoked against this war. Sir, every prin- 
ciple of our holy religion comes in conflict with this war. 
What, will you talk to Christians about sending an army to 
invade a neighboring nation ; to shoot down our brethren of 
Mexico upon their own soil; to storm their fortifications, to 
cannonade their cities, to involve whole families, consisting of all 
ages, and of both sexes, in those revolting scenes of blood and 
slaughter which were witnessed at Monterey and at Tobasco? 
Can we expect Christians to remain silent, while reading the 
dark list of damning crimes which have been committed upon 
a weak and distracted people, by those armed ruffians and mur- 
derers who have been commissioned by this government to 
make war upon our fellow beings on the other side of the Rio 
Grande ? 

If we credit the intelligence we receive from the army, de- 
fenceless females are violated, and unarmed peasants are shot 
down like brutes. Whose blood does not curdle in his veins, 
when reading such accounts as have lately been sent forth 
from our army ? We have probably all noticed the account 
lately published where the females of a family were insulted 
and abused by those belonging to the army. During the night, 
one of the offenders, a Texian officer, was assassinated, and in 
the morning his body was discovered. The " Texan Rangers " 



284 the president's annual message. 

were said to have gone forth, and to have shot and murdered 
from eighty to one hundred unarmed and innocent peasants, in 
revenge for the death of their guilty comrade. These murder- 
ers, these worse than murderers, are paid by the freemen of 
this nation. They are sent there by our President under pre- 
tence of maintaining our national honor, while they thus dis- 
grace humanity. Is it expected that the religious sensibilities 
of our people will slumber in silence, while our nation thus 
" reeks with crimes which smell to heaven ? " Will the Presi- 
dent and his supporters smother the religious feelings of the 
nation ? Will they silence the voice of those whose vocation 
is to proclaim "peace on earth and good will to men ? " It 
appears to me that moral darkness has spread over our land, 
or these things would not have passed by so silently. I regret 
to say that the clergy have not spoken on this subject as be- 
comes the " ministers of the gospel of peace." 

The history of the world shows that national crimes have 
ever been followed by national judgments. This government 
has hurried to premature graves, without any just cause, at 
least four thousand human beings, who had committed no 
crime ; neither had they offended us, or our government. 
Many thousands in this government, and in Mexico, have been 
clad in mourning, and afflicted with the loss of husbands, broth- 
ers, and sons. And can we hope to escape the penalty so 
manifestly due for our national crimes ? Do we expect that 
the immutable law of justice will be suspended or repealed, in 
order that our nation may pass unpunished? Sir, I would 
earnestly invoke every preacher of the gospel, every professor 
of our holy religion, every lover of his country, to put forth 
his utmost influence to stop this tide of crime, of physical and 
moral death, now rolling over Mexico. 

But a most interesting question is soon to be presented to the 
members of this body. We shall in a few days be called on to 
provide the means for carrying on this war. To authorize the 
sending of more troops to that Mexican golgotha, and to appro- 
priate the money of our people, to continue the crimes and 
murders now committed there. Sir, I speak for myself, and 



THE PRESIDENT'S ANNUAL MESSAGE. 285 

for my constituents, when I say that no earthly power will 
induce me to vote away the life of a single soldier to carry on 
this attempt to subjugate Mexico, by butchering her people. 
No, Sir; were I to do it, my people would, in my opinion, 
immediately call on me to resign my seat here, that it may be 
filled by one who would use his efforts to lustrate them from 
the guilt of this unholy war. 

Our army having conquered one city after another, and one 
State after another, is now in the interior of Mexico, holding 
possession of her towns and States. * We know that it is a war 
of conquest, commenced and carried on for the purpose of dis- 
membering Mexico. Now, with all these facts before me, were 
I to vote for the appropriation of men and money to continue 
this wicked and murderous war, and to carry out these designs, 
I feel before Heaven that I should make myself a party to it. 
I feel that I should become involved in the crimes and blood- 
shed of those we send there. That act must be done by others, 
if done at all. I dare not participate in it. I am aware that 
some who view the war as I do, urge that as the nation is now 
engaged in it, we ought to help carry it forward by voting sup- 
plies of men and money. I do not see the force of the argu- 
ment. If it be in fact a wicked and unjust war, it follows that 
the longer it is carried on, the greater will be the wickedness 
and the injustice of those who continue it. But it is said that 
to press the war with vigor, will be the shortest mode of obtain- 
ing a just and honorable peace. If the war be unjust and dis- 
honorable, I am wholly unable to discover how a vigorous pro- 
secution of it, and a consequent increase of injustice and wrong, 
can, in the nature of things, be right or proper. 

On the contrary, every pang we inflict, every life we sacri- 
fice in this miserable war, must increase our guilt, and conse- 
quently our disgrace. There is but one way for the friends of 
our country and of humanity to do. That is, to use our efforts 
to stop the war, to withdraw our army from Mexican territory, 
and to tender to her honorable terms of peace. If then she 
rejects our offer, and assails us, there will be but one voice and 
one mind on the subject of defending our country. I am aware 



286 the president's annual message. 

that it is said by some that war is popular. I know that to be 
an error, so far as concerns northern Ohio, and such portions 
of other States as I have travelled in since this war has 
existed. Its advocates are few, and they are daily diminishing. 
The people can find no possible reason why their moral purity 
should be sacrificed by its crimes, or their pecuniary interests 
to its support. They can see no good cause why a debt should 
be contracted, that shall rest upon their children, and perhaps 
upon their children's children. That this feeling has taken 
deep hold of the public mind, is shown by the result of the 
late elections. That feeling is destined to extend and spread, 
until those who brought this war upon us shall be driven from 
the high places of the nation. But it is said that we must 
press the war, or surrender up the conquests we have made. 
I reply, those conquests are robberies, and the sooner they are 
given up, the better for our country. When, in 1776, such an 
argument was advanced in the House of Commons, in regard 
to the war then waged against our Colonies by Great Britain, 
Mr. Fox said : 

" The noble lord who moved the amendment said, that we were in the 
dilemma of conquering or abandoning America. If we are reduced to that, I 
am for abandoning'America." 

I, Sir, am for abandoning Mexico at once. Let our troops 
be withdrawn immediately, and let peace be made. But the 
President informs the nation, that the war will be pressed until 
Mexico shall yield to our demands ! Mr. Burke, in answer to 
a similar remark respecting the war against us in 1776, in the 
House of Commons, said : 

" That it is unbecoming the wisdom and prudence of Parliament to proceed 
any further in the support of this fruitless, expensive, and destructive war; 
more especially without any specific terms of accommodation declared." 

Sir, these were the sentiments of the illustrious patriots of 
that age. They were under a monarchy — we happily live in 
a republic. But they certainly spoke more fearlessly than 
we do. They looked to the great principles of truth and 
justice, and acted under their dictates. They felt no appre- 
hensions of popular disapprobation for acting in favor of 



THE PRESIDENT'S ANNUAL MESSAGE. 287 

humanity. Upon this question of making appropriations to carry- 
on the war against the colonies, Mr. Fox, in the House of 
Commons, April 24th, 1776, said: 

" To the resolutions he should give a flat negative, and that not because of 
any particular objection to the taxes proposed, (although it might be a suffi- 
cient ground for urging many,) but because he could not conscientiously agree 
to grant any money for so destructive, so ignoble a purpose, as the carrying on 
a war commenced unjustly, and supported with no other view than to the ex- 
tirpation of freedom, and the violation of every social comfort. This he con- 
ceived to be the strict line of conduct to be observed by a member of Parlia- 
ment." 

" Col. Barre followed, and adopted the phrase of Mr. Fox, giving his flat 
negative to the resolutions, as they were calculated to tax the subject for an 
unjust purpose." 

These were the sentiments of the most distinguished members 
of the British Parliament — of men whom we delight to honor. 
They, Sir, were " -whigs" * and, by rigidly adhering to the dic- 

* In the Lords, February 16, 1778, the Marquis of Rockingham said: 
" He was determined to serve his country by making peace at any rate." 
In the Lords, March 23, 1778, the Duke of Richmond brought forward a 
motion for the withdrawing the forces from America. 

In the Commons, November 27, 1780, on a motion to thank General Clinton 
and others for their military services in America, Mr. Wilkes said : 

" I think it my duty to oppose this motion, because in my idea every part of 
it conveys an approbation of the American war — a war unfounded in prin- 
ciple, and fatal in its consequences to this country. * * * Sir, I will not 
thank for victories which only tend to protract a destructive war. * * * 
As I reprobate the want of principle in the origin of the American war, I the 
more lament all the spirited exertions of valor and the wisdom of conduct 
which in a good cause I warmly applaud. Thinking as I do, I see more matter 
of grief than of triumph, of bewailing than thanksgiving, in this civil contest, 
and the deluge of blood which has overflowed America. * * * I deeply 
lament that the lustre of such splendid victories is obscured and darkened 
by the want of a good cause, without which no war, in the eye of truth and 
reason, before God or man, can be justified." 
Mr. Fox said: 

" He aUowed the merits of the officers now in question, but he made a dis 
tinction between thanks and praise. He might admire then valor, but he 
could not separate the intention from the action; they were united in his 
mind." 
In the House of Lords, October 31st, the Duke of Grafton said : 
" He pledged himself to the House and to the public that, while he had a leg 
to stand on, he would come down day after day to express the most marked 
abhorrence of the measures hitherto pursued, and meant to be adhered to in 
respect to America." 



288 the president's annual message. 

tales of justice, by their uniform opposition to the war, which they 
believed wrong and unjust, they secured the popular approba- 
tion, compelled the tories, the advocates of that unjust war, 
to make peace with the colonies, and finally drove them from 
power, and themselves assumed the control of the government. 
The people ever have been, and ever will be, in favor of justice ; 
and, although an humble member of this body, I will respect- 
fully suggest, that were the whigs of '46 to follow the example 
of those in the British Parliament of '76, a like result would 
follow. Indeed, I could as soon doubt .of my own existence, 
as I could doubt my duty in regard to this war. Those who 
oppose it, will stand justified and approved by the sentiment of 
this and of coming ages. It is impossible that a Christian 
people — a people who worship a God of justice — can uphold 
a rapacious war of conquest like this, and spend their money 
in spreading distress, devastation, and death among a neighbor- 
ing people. It is impossible that a Christian people shall lend 
their sanction, their encouragement, to a war waged with the 
openly avowed purpose of extending slavery, of perpetuating 
oppression, of opening up new slave-markets for the sale of 
mankind. These sophistries, these misrepresentations, these 
self-contradictions of the President, will not deceive the peo- 
ple. They are conscious that this vast expenditure of treasure 
and of blood, is made to sustain the most revolting system of 
oppression that has ever cursed the human family. 






PAYMENT FOR SLAVES. 



MAN CANNOT BE MADE PROPERTY — VIEW OF THOSE WHO FRAMED THE 
CONSTITUTION — MILITARY POWER TO IMPRESS SLAVES — MAY SET THEM 
FREE — NO CONSTITUTIONAL POWER TO PAY THE PUBLIC MONEYS FOR 
SLAVES — RIGHTS OF THE FREE STATES — HISTORY OF CONGRESSIONAL 
LEGISLATION ON THIS SUBJECT. 

[Since 1816, a portion of the members of Congress from the South, have 
endeavored to induce that body to regard slaves as property, and to pay for 
them when lost in the public service. The whole history of Congressional leg- 
islation on that subject, is given in the following speech. The bill had passed 
through the- Committee of the Whole, and been ordered to its engrossment by 
a handsome majority. Mr. Giddings moved to reconsider the vote ordering it 
to be engrossed, and on that motion made the following remarks. He then 
withdrew his motion ; and on the question of its third reading, it was defeated. 
This vote was subsequently reconsidered, and the bill passed the House, but 
was never brought up in the Senate.] 

Mr. Speaker, — I had not intended to participate in this 
debate. I did not believe the bill before us could find favor in 
this body ; and I had so often occupied the floor on questions 
connected with slavery, that I permitted the bill to pass through 
the Committee of the Whole, and to its engrossment, without 
any expression of my views. But from the favor with which 
gentlemen regard it, I apprehend they have not carefully con- 
sidered the principles involved in its passage. There are cer- 
tain great and fundamental doctrines which lie at the founda- 
tion of our government. We profess to " hold these truths to 
be self-evident, that all men are created equal ; " yet the bill 

* Speech on the bill to pay the heirs of Antonia Pacheco for a slave. De- 
livered in the House of Representatives, December 28, 1848. 

25 



290 N PAYMENT FOR SLAVES. 

before us admits one man to be the property of another ; that 
one man may rightfully hold another subject to his will, may 
scourge him into obedience, and compel him to labor for the 
benefit of his master. We profess to believe that all men " are 
endowed by their Creator with the inalienable right to the 
enjoyment of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness ; " yet 
the bill before us admits the claimant to have rightfully held 
the liberty and happiness of his fellow man at his entire dis- 
posal. 

Now if we pass this bill, our professions will be in direct 
contradiction to our practice. If we really hold to these doc- 
trines, it is certain that we must oppose this bill ; and it is 
equally certain that if we pass this bill, we shall, by such act, 
deny these truths. "We each of us either deny these doctrines, 
or we hold to them. We cannot do both. To say that we hold 
to them, and at the same time support this bill, would be plac- 
ing onr professions in direct contradiction to our actions. The 
inconsistency would be too obvious to deceive any one. Tell 
me not that you hold to the undying truths contained in our 
Declaration of Independence, and at the same time sit here to 
estimate the value, in dollars and cents, of the body and mind 
of your fellow man. 

Those who founded our government declared their ulterior 
object. That object was to " secure all men (residing within 
our jurisdiction) in the enjoyment of life, liberty, and the pur- 
suit of happiness." Are we to-day carrying out these objects? 
Here, Sir, are two hundred and thirty American statesmen 
legislating for the benefit of slavery. There is no evading this 
plain and obvious fact. No subterfuge can hide it from the 
people. The powers of government were instituted by our 
patriotic fathers for the express purpose of securing to all for 
whom we legislate the blessings of liberty. We are now sit- 
ting here to compensate the oppressor of his fellow man for his 
inability to continue his power over the victim of his barbarous 
cupidity. The members who vote for this bill, will give unmis- 
takable evidence of their approbation of slavery, and their 
willingness to sustain it. 



PAYMENT FOR SLAVES. 291 

Before I proceed further, I will give a synopsis of the facts 
involved in the case. The claimant, in 1835, residing in Flor- 
ida, professed to own a negro man named Lewis. This man is 
said to have been very intelligent, speaking four languages, 
which he read and wrote with facility. The master hired him 
to an officer of the United States, to act as a guide to the 
troops under the command of Major Dade, for which he was to 
receive twenty-five dollars per month. The duties were dan- 
gerous, and the price was proportioned to the danger. At the 
time these troops were massacred, this slave, Lewis, deserted to 
the enemy, or was captured by them. He remained with the 
Indians, acting with them in their depredations against the 
white people, until 1837, when General Jessup says he was cap- 
tured by a detachment of troops under his command. An Indian 
chief, named Jumper, surrendered with Lewis, whom he 
claimed as a slave, having, as he said, captured him at the 
time of Dade's defeat. General Jessup declares, that he re- 
garded him as a dangerous man ; that he was supposed to have 
kept up a correspondence with the enemy from the time he joined 
Major Dade until the defeat of that officer ; that to insure the 
public safety, he ordered him sent west with the Indians; 
believing that, if left in the country, he would be employed 
against our troops. He was sent west ; and the claimant now 
asks that we shall pay him a thousand dollars as the value of 
this man's body. 

The Committee on Military Affairs were unable to unite in a 
report upon the case. Five slave-holders, representing slave 
property on this floor, and constituting a majority of the com- 
mittee, have reported a bill for the payment of this amount to 
the claimant. Four northern members, representing freemen 
only, have made a minority report against the bill. This report 
of the minority, I think, is sustained by irrefutable arguments. 

The majority of the committee assume the position that 
slaves are regarded by the Federal Constitution as property, 
and that this government and the people of the free States are 
bound to regard them as such, and to pay for them as we would 
for so many mules or oxen taken into the public service. The 



292 PAYMENT FOR SLAVES. 

minority deny this doctrine. They insist that the Federal 
Constitution treats them as persons only, and that this govern- 
ment cannot constitutionally involve the people of the free 
States in the guilt of sustaining slavery ; that we have no con- 
stitutional powers to legislate upon the relation of master and 
slave. 

There are several other points on which the committee 
differ, some of which I intend to notice ; but I propose first to 
examine for a few moments that of the constitutional power. 
It is due to myself and to the country that I should call public 
attention distinctly to the fact, that these questions are forced 
upon us by southern gentlemen, against the wishes and remon- 
strance of every member of the committee from the free States. 
Involving as it does the great fundamental principles of our 
government, a distinguished member from the North, (Mr. 
Rockwell of Connecticut,) introduced a resolution to close the 
debate in one hour from the time we went into committee. I 
thought it unbecoming northern members to attempt thus to 
stifle debate on so important a matter, forced upon us by the 
South. I therefore called for the ayes and noes on that reso- 
lution, and now hold the floor by a sort of legislative fraud, 
having voted for the engrossment of the bill, with the sole 
object of obtaining the floor. 

Sir, at the formation of the Constitution, slavery was con- 
demned in the severest language by the delegates who framed 
that instrument. It is true they had been regarded in England 
as property. In 1749, Lord Hardwicke had decided that tro- 
ver lay for a slave in the British courts. That was the last 
decision of the kind made in England, or in civilized Europe. 
One hundred years have elapsed since that decision. Its doc- 
trines have been a thousand times discarded, contemned, and 
overthrown by the statesmen and jurists of that nation ; but 
here, in an American Congress, we now hear this barbarous 
doctrine revived. 

In 1772, Lord Mansfield boldly assailed the doctrine laid 
down in this hall to-day, and exhibited its absurdity in one of 
the ablest opinions to be found on record. From that period, 



PAYMENT FOR SLAVES. 293 

this doctrine of property in man has found no supporters under 
the government of England. With all our refinement as a 
nation, with all our boasted adherence to liberty, on this subject 
we are three quarters of a century behind our mother country. 
When Sir Warren Hastings was on trial in the House of 
Peers, in 1787, Mr. Sheridan, speaking on this subject, in his 
own peculiar and fervid eloquence, declared that — 

" Allegiance to that power which gives us the forms of men, commands us to 
maintain the rights of men; and never yet was this truth dismissed from the 
human heart ; never in any time, in any age ; never in any clime where rude 
man ever had any social feelings; never was this unextinguishable truth 
destroyed from the heart of man, placed as it is in the core and centre of it by 
his Maker, that man was not made the property of man.' 1 '' 

This was the language of British statesmen sixty-two years 
since. To-day, we have before this branch of the American 
Congress the report of a committee, avowing that, under this 
Federal Government, in the middle of the nineteenth century, 
" man is the property of his fellow mortal." 

These sentiments of the British statesmen and jurists, in- 
spired the hearts of our American patriots in 1776, when they 
declared it to be a " self-evident truth that all men are created 
equal." When they framed our Constitution, they declared 
their object was " to establish justice, and to secure to them- 
selves and their posterity the blessings of liberty." This sub- 
ject of holding property in men did not escape their attention, 
nor have they left us ignorant of their views in regard to it. 
Mr. Madison, the father of the Constitution, has left to us a 
clear and explicit account of their intentions. He informs us, 
that on 

" Wednesday, August 22, the Convention proceeded to consider the report of 
the Committee of Detail, in relation to duties on exports, a capitation tax, and 
a navigation act. The fourth section reported was as follows : 

" ' No tax or duty shall be laid by the Legislature on articles exported from 
any State, nor on the migration nor importation of such persons as the several 
States shall think proper to admit; nor shall such migration nor importation be 
prohibited.' 

" Mr. Gerry thought we had nothing to do with the conduct of the States as to 
slavery, but toe ought to be careful not to give it any sanction." 

Our people think, with Mr. Gerry, that " we have nothing 
25* 



294: TAYMENT FOR SLAVES. 

to do with slavery in the States." We are determined that we 
will not be involved in its guilt. With Mr. Gerry, we intend 
" to be careful to give it no sanction." No, Sir ; we will not 
sanction your slavery by paying our money for the bodies of 
slaves. This is the doctrine which we hold, and which we 
expect to maintain ; yet the members of this body are now 
engaged in legislating upon the price of human flesh. If we 
pass this bill, we shall give our most solemn sanction to that 
institution which Gerry and his compatriots detested. Will the 
members from Pennsylvania, the successors of Franklin and 
Wilson, lend their sanction to slavery, by voting the moneys of 
the people to pay for slaves ? 

But Mr. Madison tells us that " Mr. Sherman (of Connec- 
ticut) was opposed to any tax on slaves, as making the matter 
worse, because it implied they were property" 

I understand that some gentlemen from the North admit 
that slaves are property. Mr. Sherman, and the framers of the 
Constitution, would do no act by which it could be implied that 
they were property. 

Mr. Madison also participated in the discussion himself; and, 
as he informs us, " declared that he thought it wrong to admit that 
there could be property in men." And the report of the com- 
mittee was so amended as to exclude that idea. 

In that assemblage of illustrious statesmen, no man expressed 
his dissent from these doctrines of Gerry, of Sherman, and of 
Madison. These doctrines are : 1. That we " should have 
nothing to do with slavery, but ought to be careful not to give 
it any sanction." 2. That " we should do no act by which it 
can be implied that there can be property in men." 3. " That 
it would be wrong for us to admit that there can be property in 
men" Such were the views of those who framed the Consti- 
tution. Will this House stand by them ? 

The gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. Burt) declared 
that he would leave us no room to escape this issue ; " no loop- 
hole at which to get out ; " that we must say by our votes, 
either that there is property in men under the Federal Consti- 
tution, or that there is not. I am most happy to meet the gen- 



PAYMENT FOR SLATES. 295 

tleman on that point, and am prepared to submit the question 
to those who framed that instrument, to Mr. Madison. His 
decision is left on record. The only question is, — Have the 
representatives of the people here the firmness and the inde- 
pendence to maintain the Constitution? There stands the 
record of their intentions. " He who runs may read." No 
man can fail to understand the intentions of those who framed 
our political compact. Those intentions constitute the very 
spirit of the Constitution, which we are sworn to support. The 
people of the free States are aware of the objects and inten- 
tions of those patriots. They know their rights under the 
Constitution ; they hold the indisputable right to be free, and 
entirely exempt from the corroding stain of slavery. So per- 
fectly were these principles understood in the early days of the 
republic, that after the war of the Revolution no man asked 
pay for his slaves that were taken from him, or killed in the 
public service. 

In the year 1830, the Register of the Treasury declared that 
no instance of the payment for slaves, during the Revolution, 
was to be found on record. No, Sir ; Madison and Jefferson 
and their contemporaries were then living. They well under- 
stood the principles on which the Union had been formed. 
They respected the rights of the free as well as of the slave 
States, and no man then attempted to involve the people of the 
North in the support of slavery. I believe the first attempt to 
make this government pay for slaves was in 1816. This was 
twenty-six years after the adoption of the Constitution, and 
forty -two years after the Declaration of American Independ- 
ence. It is an important historical fact, that shows clearly the 
opinions then entertained on this subject. 

After the close of the late war with England, a bill was 
pending in this House, providing for the payment of property 
lost or destroyed during that war. When the section providing 
for the payment of horses, carts, etc., which were impressed 
into public service and destroyed, Mr. Maryant, from South 
Carolina, moved to amend the bill so as to embrace slaves. 
The motion was opposed by Mr. Yancy and Mr. Robertson, 



296 PAYMENT FOR SLAVES. 

and was negatived by a large majority.* That was a motion 
so to amend the bill as to pay for slaves, if killed in the public 
service, when they had been impressed. I have heard northern 
members express the opinion, pending this bill, that we ought 
to pay for slaves, if lost, when they were impressed into the 
service. Sir, such was not the case thirty-five years since. 
Our predecessors then spurned the proposition. Where now 
is the feeling, the spirit, which animated them ? We have no 
record of the speeches, but every member will see that the 
case proposed was the strongest case that could be imagined. 
It was where a slave was taken against the will of the master, 
and pressed into the service, and killed by the enemy. Yet 
they rejected the proposition by a large majority. The claim 
before us is of incomparably less force. Here the master hired 
the slave, at a high price, to go with the troops as a guide, and 
of course took upon himself all risks. 

The next case was that of D'Auterive. He had claims 
against the United States for wood and other necessaries fur- 
nished the army, and for the loss of time and expense of nurs- 
ing a slave, who was wounded in the service of government at 
New Orleans. This case is more interesting from the fact, that 
there was at that time an attempt, as on the present occasion, 
to break down that well-known principle in our Constitution, 
that " slaves are persons, and not property." 

The Committee on Claims at that time (1828) was composed 
of four northern and three southern men. At its head was an 
honorable southern man, (Lewis Williams of North Carolina,) 
who served his country longer in this body than any other that 
ever sat in this hall. For more than a quarter of a century, 
he was a distinguished member of this House. There are 
few, very few, now present, who had the pleasure of serving 
with him ; but his contemporaries can attest to his great abili- 
ties and deserved influence. That committee reported in favor 
of allowing compensation for the articles furnished to the army, 
but said, expressly, that " slaves not being property, they could 

* See National Intelligencer, December 28, 1816. 



PAYMENT FOR SLAVES. 297 

not allow the master any compensation for his loss." This was 
the unanimous report — Mr. Williams of North Carolina, Mr. 
McCoy of Virginia, and Mr. Owen of Alabama, uniting in the 
report. Mr. Williams had been contemporaneous with Madi- 
son and Jefferson, and he did not hesitate to avow the doctrines 
of the Constitution, and to maintain them. Here is the record 
of his opinion, and of the views of his associates. When the 
bill came up in Committee of the Whole, certain southern 
gentlemen suddenly became excited, worked themselves into a 
passion, threatened a dissolution of the Union, and all that sort 
of thing. In short, they manifested that spirit of dictation and 
intimidation which we have so often witnessed on more recent 
occasions. They made a strenuous effort to reverse the de- 
cision of the Committee on Claims ; but, after some two weeks' 
discussion, gave it up, laid the subject on the table, and there 
the matter ended. 

This discussion was thirty -nine years subsequent to the adop- 
tion of the Constitution, and more than fifty from the Declara- 
tion of Independence. The principle that slaves were persons t 
and not property, was reaffirmed, upon full discussion, without 
the light which we possess on the subject. The Madison 
Papers were not then published. The views of Gerry and 
Sherman and Madison, in the Convention, and the action of 
that body in relation to this matter, were unknown to them. 
Should we now reverse that decision, and overturn the practice, 
we shall sin against greater light than they possessed. 

The next, and only remaining instance in which the question 
of appropriating the treasure of the nation to pay for slaves, 
was in 1843. "A bill for the relief the people of West 
Florida," intended to provide for the payment of slaves taken 
by the army of General Jackson from the inhabitants of that 
Territory, in 1814, came up for discussion. The slaves had 
been taken, against the consent of their owners, by the military 
power of the nation. I think there were about ninety, taken 
from different individuals. The proposition was distinct in its 
character. The object of the bill was to pay for human flesh. 
I myself opened the debate, and stated, as the principal grounds 



298 PAYMENT FOR SLAVES. 

of my opposition to it, that slaves were not regarded as pro- 
perty under the Federal Constitution. My venerable and 
lamented friend, now no more, (John Quincy Adams,) sustained 
my positions. Several southern gentlemen spoke in favor of 
the bill. The Journal is now before me, and shows the bill to 
have been rejected, by a vote of one hundred and thirteen to 
thirty-six. This was done by a whig Congress. Not one of 
that party from the free States voted for the bill. 

I have now given a history of our legislation on this subject. 
There was a bill passed this body, " sub silentio" on one of 
those days when there is, by the rules of the House, no discus- 
sion, by which payment was made for a slave. My friend 
from Pennsylvania (Mr. Dickey) has stated the facts in regard to 
it. I knew that such a bill was pending, and so did Mr. Adams ; 
and we had mutually" agreed to oppose its passage; but it 
slipped through unnoticed, and, therefore, constitutes no pre- 
cedent. 

In 1843, a bill passed this body to pay over moneys obtained 
by the government from Great Britain, and held in trust by 
us, to be paid to the owners of slaves lost on board the " Comet 
and Encomium." This bill also passed the Senate, and became 
a law. At the last session we passed two bills to pay over 
moneys held in trust for the same purpose. These cases were 
not to take the treasure of the people of the free States to 
pay for slaves, but to pay over money that did not belong to 
us, but which we held for the use of those who claimed it. 
But, from the dawn of the Revolution to this day, being more 
than seventy years, this House has expressed but one opinion 
on this subject. They have at all times refused to tax the 
people of the North to pay for the slaves of the South. We 
have never regarded them as property. 

But an attempt is now making to change the essential ele- 
ments of our government. Statesmen, now, in the high coun- 
cils of the nation, deny that " all men are created equal ; " that 
" they are endowed by their Creator with the inalienable right 
to their lives and their liberties ; or, that " governments are 
instituted among men to secure the enjoyment of those rights." 



PAYMENT FOR SLAVES. 299 

It is now urged that this government was instituted for the 
purpose of robbing men of those rights ; of disrobing a por- 
tion of our race of their humanity, and reducing them to the 
state of brutes, and making them the property of others. 
Will northern members assist to commit this outrage upon the 
honor of the nation and the constitutional rights of the northern 
States ? Is there a*member from the free States who will vote 
to tax his constituents to pay for southern slaves ? If so, let 
such members place their names on record in favor of this bill, 
and let that record descend to coming generations, as a lasting 
memento of the principles which guide them. 

I have now referred to the history of our legislation on this 
subject. The action of our committees was well commented 
upon by my friend from New Hampshire, (Mr. Wilson). I 
wish, however, to add a few words on this point. I am not 
aware that any committee of this House ever reported in favor 
of paying for slaves, until the First Session of 27th Congress — 
being more than sixty-five years from the formation of the 
government. 

In 1830, my predecessor, the Hon. E. Whittlesey, reported 
upon the case of Francis Larche. This was the case alluded 
to by the gentleman from South Carolina, (Mr. Burt). I 
understood him to say that the slave of Larche was not im- 
pressed. 

Mr. Burt. The gentleman is mistaken. The statement 
which I made was this : that no case could be adduced in 
which a refusal to pay for a slave had been made, on the 
ground that he is not property. The gentleman is totally mis- 
taken. 

Mr. Giddings. I certainly understand the gentleman now, 
and I refer particularly to the case of D'Auterive, which was 
rejected on this identical point. The committee say, in express 
language, that " slaves have never been placed on the footing of 
property." And they rejected the claim distinctly on that point. 

But to return to the case of Larche. The Committee on 
Claims of the Senate (vide Rep. H. R., 401, 1st Session, 21st 
Congress) say, in distinct language, that — 



300 PAYMENT FOR SLAVES. 

" The cart, horse, and negro man Antoine, belonging to the petitioner, were 
impressed, and sent to the lines of the American army, on the 1st day of Janu- 
ary, 1815, where the negro man was killed by a cannon ball from the British 
batteries." 

The gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. Burt) assures us 
that he was not impressed. I can hardly suppose that he was 
authorized thus distinctly to deny the accuracy of that report, in 
a matter of fact. However that may be, it is certain that the 
committee understood that the man was impressed. They 
therefore acted upon that hypothesis ; and with that belief, the 
committee unanimously reported against the bill. No stronger 
case can be imagined. The horse, cart, and negro were 
impressed, as the committee reported and believed. The peti- 
tioner was paid for the property, — that is, the horse and 
car t ? — but the claim for the slave was rejected. Yet, Sir, they 
had not the advantages of knowing the sentiments of the 
framers of the Constitution which we possess. They were 
unconscious that the members of the Convention declared, that 
" they ought to he careful to give no sanction to slavery ; " that 
they should do nothing by which "it could be implied that 
slaves were property ; " " that it was wrong to admit that there 
could be property in man." I repeat, that to the best of my 
knowledge, (and I have bestowed much labor upon the sub- 
ject,) no report was made in favor of paying for slaves from 
the public treasury during the first half century which this 
government existed under the present Constitution. 

If wrong on any of these points, I ask gentlemen to correct 
me here, before the country. Let them expose my errors in 
the presence of this House, where I can meet them ; where, 
with truth on my side, I stand prepared to defend my positions. 
Let gentlemen stand forth in this hall and meet my facts and 
arguments like men, like statesmen, and not shrink away in 
silence, and then set their letter-writers to assail me, — to pour 
forth their miserable abuse upon my humble self. Why, Sir, 
suppose they destroy me, they will leave my doctrines, my 
principles, untouched. They will remain while eternity shall 
last. 






PAYMENT FOR SLAVES. 301 

But to resume the history of this subject. In the 27th Con- 
gress, the claim of James Watson, for slaves, was committed 
to the Committee of Claims, of which I was myself chairman . 
The friends of the claim, by some means, learned that that 
committee had always reported against the payment for slaves. 
They therefore obtained the transfer of that case to the Com- 
mittee on Indian Affairs, who reported a bill to pay for the 
slaves claimed by Watson. That report, made seven years 
since, was the first in favor of paying for slaves, so far as my 
knowledge extends, ever made to this body. During the same 
session, a report from the Committee on Territories was made 
of the " bill for the relief of the people of West Florida," to 
which I have already alluded, and which was rejected by the 
House. 

Mr. Burt. Will the gentleman allow me the floor a mo- 
ment? 

Mr. Giddings. With pleasure. 

Mr. Burt. I stated in committee the other day, in reply to 
the interrogatory of the gentleman from Ohio, that Mr. Whit- 
tlesey, in his report on Larche's case, quoted the report of the 
Senate. I stated further, , that Mr. Williams, to whom the 
gentleman from Ohio alluded, made a report in the Senate, on 
this case of Larche, saying that there was no evidence that the 
slave had been impressed at all. I stated further, that I had 
examined the Senate files in that case ; and there is no evi- 
dence there, except the depositions of one or two men, (in the 
absence of any order,) that he was impressed at all. 

Mr. Giddings. Here is the historical record, the documen- 
tary proof, on which we are bound to act. I ask the gentle- 
man from South Carolina if he intends to overthrow it by his 
sidebar testimony ? 

Mr. Burt. What is it ? 

Mr. Giddings. That this man was impressed. 

Mr. Burt. I do, Sir. There is no evidence of the fact. 

Mr. Giddings. Then I leave the gentleman to take issue 
with the history. The documentary evidence is, that this slave 
was impressed; that he was taken to the American lines, and 
26 



302 PAYMENT FOR SLAVES. 

was there "killed by a cannon shot from the enemy's bat- 
teries." 

At the period to which I refer, I had been placed at the 
head of the Committee on Claims, by the then Speaker of this 
House, (Hon. John White of Kentucky,) of whom, though a 
slave-holder, I can never speak except with respect. There 
were at that time many claims for slaves before that commit- 
tee. It was our settled policy to make no reports on those 
cases, lest we should stir up agitation on this delicate question. 

In this hall, before the House, I was interrogated by a slave- 
holder (Mr. "Wise of Virginia) on this subject. I was asked 
distinctly whether our committee would report in favor of pay- 
ing for slaves ? I answered, that we would follow the estab- 
lished practice on that subject. He replied, that my answer 
was evasive, but that the established practice was not to pay 
for slaves. It so happened, that on the 21st March, 1842, 1 
introduced certain resolutions declaring the rights of the peo- 
ple of the free States to be exempt from the support of the 
slave-trade. For this I was censured and driven from my 
seat. Another member was added to the Committee on Claims ; 
and then, Sir, during my absence, just eight days after I left 
the committee, this case was urged upon the members, who 
were most of them inexperienced in their duties, and unac- 
quainted with the precedents. I left this hall on the 2 2d of 
March, and, on the 1st day of April following, a bill was 
reported by a slave-holding member of that committee, to pay 
for this man Lewis. This was the first case of the kind that 
ever received a favorable report from that particular commit- 
tee ; and that report was obtained in the manner just stated. 
It was in the sixty-seventh year of American Independence, 
and the fifty-third of our Constitution. This is the history of 
this bill. It was reported seven years since by a whig commit- 
tee. We are yet to see whether this House can be induced to 
pass it. 

Sir, we have the power to overturn the practice of this body 
from its first formation ; we may overthrow its established and 
time-honored principles ; we may defeat the objects of those 



PAYMENT FOR SLAVES. 303 

who framed the Constitution; we may subvert the essential 
elements of that sacred compact which we are sworn to sup- 
port ; we may attempt to change the law of our existence, — to 
deface the work of God, and declare his image to be property ; 
we may do all this at the bidding of the slave power ; we may 
humble ourselves in the presence of those who hold the rod of 
terror over us ; but there is a superior power that will hold us 
to a strict account of our stewardship. Sir, the eyes of the 
people are upon us ; they are watching our actions. The con- 
centrated rays of intelligence now brought to bear upon all our 
doings, render it impossible for us to deceive them. No eva- 
sion, no subterfuge will screen those who would render north- 
ern freemen subsidiary to the support of southern slavery. 

To this day there has been in this hall sufficient indepen- 
dence and patriotism to reject all propositions of this humiliating 
character. As I have said, we are now driven to legislate by 
southern slave-holders, under the lash. 

Mr. Burt. I hope the gentleman from Ohio will allow me 
this opportunity to disclaim utterly and indignantly any such 
imputation. 

Mr. Gtddings. Withdraw it, then. 

Mr. Burt. I venture to appeal to this whole committee, 
who heard my remarks. 

Mr. Giddings. I thought, when the gentleman said he 
would hold northern gentlemen to this point, whether a slave 
was property, — " that he would leave no loophole for us to 
escape" — I thought it looked somewhat like the language of 
intimidation ; it smacked somewhat of the plantation, of the 
crack of the whip. And I took it unkind in the gentleman 
from Connecticut, that, under such circumstances, he should 
attempt to stifle debate, to seal the lips of northern men. 

This bill is pressed upon us at this particular time, when 
southern men are holding conventions, and manufacturing their 
usual amount of mock thunder for dissolving the Union, in 
consequence of our agitation. We hear it rolling along the 
heavens. It affords amusement to our school-boys, who crack 
their jokes and sing ditties in regard to it. 



304: PAYMENT FOR SLAVES. 

Sir, when I reflect that I am now constrained to sit in this 
hall to legislate upon the price of human flesh as property, I 
feel humbled. Before the nation, before heaven, I protest 
against this degradation. By what rule shall I arrive at the 
value of this man f He is said to be very intelligent and 
learned, reading and writing four languages. In this respect, 
he has probably few equals in .this hall. I mean no offence by 
this comparison, either to gentlemen now present, or to the 
negro who is absent. I regard the moral qualities of a man as 
the proper criterion by which to graduate my respect. In this 
light, I know not whether the comparison be unjust to him or 
to those who estimate Ms value at precisely a thousand dollars. 
I would be as willing to enter into an inquiry as to the value 
of the body of the honorable member reporting this bill, as I 
am to estimate the value of a man who, as a linguist, probably 
has not a dozen equals in this body. If we are to judge of him 
by the report of the committee, if placed in this body, he might 
have reflected honor upon our country and our race. The 
splendor of his genius might have soared far above the grovel- 
ling intellects now engaged in figuring up his value in dollars 
and cents. His name might have been placed in future history 
beside that of Wirt, of Henry, of Burke, and of Sheridan ; or, 
perhaps, his philanthropy might have placed him on the roll of 
fame with Adams and Wilberforce. And yet we are now sit- 
ting here to inquire as to the value of this immortal mind, to 
estimate its price in " glittering dust." My soul shrinks from 
the impious sacrilege with loathing and disgust. But this ethe- 
real, immortal intellect, was bound in the chains of bondage, 
shut out from that sphere of usefulness and of action in which 
God designed it to move ; and we are now asked to compensate 
this claimant for committing this wrong to mankind, this crime 
against God. I am anxious to see how northern members esti- 
mate their fellow men. What price do they put upon their 
constituents ? Let their votes give the answer. 

On a former occasion, I cited the opinion of an eminent 
jurist (Judge McLean) on this subject. In the case of Groves 
v. Slaughter and others, (15 Peters's Reports, 449,) this ques- 



PAYMENT FOR SLAVES. 305 

tion came distinctly before the Supreme Court of the United 
States. 

In deciding the law, Judge McLean said : 

" By the laws of certain States, slaves are treated as property ; and the Con- 
stitution of Mississippi prohibits their being brought into that State by citizens 
of other States, for sale or as merchandise. Merchandise is a comprehensive 
term, and may include every article of traffic, whether foreign or domestic, 
which is properly embraced by a commercial regulation. But if slaves are 
considered in some of the States as merchandise, that cannot divest them of the 
leading and controlling quality of persons, by which they are designated in the 
Constitution. The character of the property is given them by the local law. 
This law is respected, and all rights under it are protected by the federal 
authorities ; but the Constitution acts upon slaves as persons, and not as prop- 
erty." 

But one member of that Court dissented from these views. 
It may, therefore, be regarded as an authority,. so far as the 
Judiciary are concerned. 

If the doctrine contended for by the friends of this bill be 
correct, if slaves be property, slave markets may be opened in 
Boston, and Massachusetts will have no power to prohibit there 
the revolting scenes which are witnessed in this city. If the 
doctrine contended for by southern men be correct, no State 
can exclude slave markets from its territory, or consecrate its 
soil to freedom. It well becomes southern gentlemen to exam- 
ine this subject, before they base themselves upon the principle 
that slaves are property. Let that be established, and Con- 
gress will have power to prohibit the internal slave-trade at its 
pleasure. 

I now proceed to another branch of the case. With great 
propriety, the gentleman from New Hampshire inquired at 
what time the liability of government to pay for this slave com* 
menced ? The question has not been answered, nor do I think 
it can be answered. The undertaking was hazardous in the 
highest degree. The troops were all killed but two or three by 
the enemy, and those were supposed to be dead. This man 
alone escaped unhurt. This danger was foreseen, and the mas- 
ter put a price upon the services to compare with the risk. 
Did this contract bind the government to pay for the master's 
loss, admitting the slave to have been property? Was it any 
26* 



306 PAYMENT FOR SLAVES. 

part of the compact that the government should insure the 
property? It strikes me that no lawyer would answer in the 
affirmative. The law of bailment is surely understood by every 
tyro in the profession. The bailee for hire is bound to exer- 
cise the same degree of care over the property that careful 
men ordinarily take of their own property. If, then, the prop- 
erty be lost, the owner sustains such loss. Now, conceding 
this man to be property, the government would not have been 
liable, had he run away, or been killed by accident, or died of 
sickness. 

Yet, Sir, when property is lost or destroyed by the act of 
God, or the common enemies of the country, no bailee is ever 
holden responsible ; not even common carriers, and that is the 
highest species of bailment. Had this officer, acting on his own 
responsibility, agreed to take this negro through the country 
for hire, (admitting the man to have been property, and gov- 
erned by the same rules of law as though he had been a mule 
or an ass,) and he had been captured by the enemy, no law 
would have held such bailee liable. But, Sir, an entirely dif- 
ferent rule of law prevails, where the owner of a chattel lets it 
to a bailee for wages. Had this man been a mule or an ass, 
and the officer had hired him of the owner for wages, to ride 
through that country, or to work in a team, or in any other 
manner, and he had been captured by the enemy, the bailee 
would not have been liable, upon any rule of law or of justice ; 
nor would he have been liable, if lost in any manner, except by 
neglect of the bailee. 

The gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. Burt) said he 
would place this case upon strictly legal principles. Sir, I 
meet the gentleman on that proposition. I, too, for the sake of 
the argument, am willing to submit it on principles of law ; 
and I believe that no jurist, or even justice of the peace, would 
hesitate to reject the claim on those grounds. All must admit 
that the liability of the government, concerning this man, ceased, 
when he was captured by the enemy; up to this point, the 
government was not liable. I understood the author of this 
bill (Mr. Burt) to argue, however, that we became liable under 



PAYMENT FOR SLAVES. 307 

the contract of bailment. That contract was ended, when the 
man was captured. The claimant then failed to perform his 
part of it. 

The stipulation on the part of the master was, that the negro 
should pilot the troops from Fort Brooke to Fort King, the 
place of their destination, at the rate of twenty-five dollars per 
month. He was captured when only half the distance was 
accomplished. Here the master ceased to perform his com- 
pact ; it was beyond his power to do so. The contract then 
ceased to exist ; and, from that time forth, the claimant had no 
demand on us, either in equity or in law. 

I now enter upon another view of this case. It is shown, by 
the testimony of General Jessup, that this man was supposed 
to have kept up an understanding with the enemy, from the 
time he united with Dade's command, until the massacre of 
that unfortunate battalion ; that, while he was with the enemy, 
which was more than two. years, he united in committing depre- 
dations upon the frontier settlements ; in short, that he was one 
of the enemy. Our army was sent there to protect this claim- 
ant, and his wife and children and neighbors, against this very 
man, who, in company with others, murdered the people of 
Florida, and destroyed their property. This expenditure of 
blood and treasure by the United States was occasioned in part 
by this very negro, for whom the master now claims compensa- 
tion. With his extraordinary intelligence, with a knowledge 
of the wrongs which he and his people had suffered at the 
hands of those who claimed them as property, he must have 
thirsted for vengeance. He could have felt no attachment, no 
respect, for a people at whose hands he had received nothing 
but abuse and degradation. It was natural that he should have 
sought revenge ; and it was natural that his master should 
become his victim, if within his power. 

But our army was sent there to protect the people against 
their slaves who were with the Indians, and their effective 
allies. It was under these circumstances that Lewis was cap- 
tured, with other enemies. General Jessup says that he would 
have tried and hanged him, if he could have found time. 



308 PAYMENT FOR SLAVES. 

This, under martial law, lie might undoubtedly have done. And 
the gentleman who reported this bill admitted that in such case 
this claim would never have been presented. Suppose he had 
been slain in battle ; I think we should never have heard of 
this claim. But why had General Jessup a right to hang him ? 
Because he was an enemy, dangerous to the people and to the 
government. But who will for a moment hesitate to say, that 
he had the same power, yea, greater power, to send him out of 
the neighborhood, than he had to slay him in battle, or to hang 
him. Humanity surely would dictate that he should be sent 
out of the neighborhood, rather than his life should be sacri- 
ficed. Has the claimant's loss been greater than it would have 
been had the negro been slain or hanged ? Not at all. He 
had been taken in arms, had committed depredations upon the 
people ; he had occasioned much loss of blood and treasure to 
the nation. Could General Jessup have left him in Florida, 
consistently with his duty ? I think not. 

Here another important question arises. Had the claimant 
any right to keep an enemy so dangerous within any civilized 
community ? Is there a member of this body who will rise in 
his place and assert that any master possesses the right to retain 
such a foe on his plantation ? Has any man the right to keep a 
rabid dog, or other animal, and suffer him to go at large in the 
community ? I am now arguing the legal question. I am con- 
sidering this man as property, the same as though he were an 
ass or a mule. And I lay it down as clear and indisputable 
law, that, had such mule or ass killed the people, and destroyed 
their property, as this man had done, any member of the com- 
munity might either have shot him, or chased him out of the 
neighborhood with impunity. 

I therefore meet the gentleman who reported this bill on 
every point involved in this case, legal, equitable, or constitu- 
tional, and I can find no merits in it. 

But, Sir, as I am for the moment engaged in a legal exam- 
ination of the case, I desire to follow it a little farther. This 
man was guilty of treason against the United States, or he was 
an enemy to our government. I think it doubtful whether 



PAYMENT FOR SLAVES. 309 

slaves can commit treason, as they owe no allegiance to our 
government, l^ut if lie was not a traitor, he was surely an 
enemy to the country. Now, Sir, whether traitor or enemy, 
and the master, knowing the fact, " had harbored him," " ad- 
hered to him," or " given him aid and comfort," would not the 
master have been guilty of the crime of misprision of treason 
against the United States, and punishment under our laws ? 
Of this I think there is no doubt. And yet we are called upon 
to pay him a thousand dollars for taking away a man thus 
dangerous to himself, who, if he had remained with him, would 
probably have subjected him to the gallows. Let gentlemen 
reflect, and vote as men, as intelligent statesmen. 

Another question arises in this case, which, to me, is equally 
fatal to the claim. A state of war existed. General Jessup 
was the commanding officer in Florida. He was the agent of 
the government ; and whatever the government might do to 
insure the safety of the people, their agent for the time being 
could accomplish under the martial law. By the term " martial 
law," I mean the war power, which is the most dangerous, the 
most indefinite, the most unlimited, exercised among nations. 

I do not refer to the rules and articles of war, but to that 
vague, indefinite, undefinable power which knows no limits. It 
is that power which, in time of war, may do any thing in the 
power of man to accomplish ; may command any sacrifice of 
the people, or of any portion of them, in order to secure the 
safety of the government, and of the subjects generally. It 
is that power which authorizes the military commander, in 
short, to do whatever he deems necessary for the security of 
the public ; by which, suspected men were arrested and im- 
prisoned in Connecticut and New York during the Revolution ; 
by which, others were ordered to leave the country ; and by 
which, others were shot down, their dwellings burned, and 
their estates confiscated. 

It is the power exercised in South Carolina, during the Rev- 
olution, by Sumter, and by Marion, and their compatriots. It 
was by virtue of this power that Jackson, at New Orleans, sus- 
pended the writ of habeas corpus — adjourned the Legislature 



310 PAYMENT FOR SLAVES. 

of Louisiana — ordered old men and boys, not legally liable to 
do military duty by law, on to the lines, to defend the city — 
sent all foreigners out of the city, as he regarded them danger- 
ous, as this man was supposed to be — suffered no communica- 
tion between the city and country — ordered a portion of the 
slaves also into service, and sent the others back into the 
interior. Many of those slaves were killed, but we have at all 
times refused to pay for them. But does any one deny these 
unlimited powers ? Not at all. If General Jackson had the 
right to send freemen and slaves away from the scene of danger, 
had not General Jessup the same power ? Most assuredly he 
had. 

But the best illustration of this tremendous power is said to 
have occurred at Fort Erie, at the time the British attacked it 
in 1814. A lieutenant commanded a picket guard at the west 
of the fort, perhaps a mile distant. A beautiful plain extends 
in that direction some half or three-fourths of a mile, bounded 
by a dense forest. He was posted in this forest. As the 
British column advanced, the brave lieutenant, with his little 
band, retreated in front of them, keeping up lus fire in gallant 
style, in order to retard their progress, and give notice to our 
men in the fort, and time for them to prepare to receive the 
enemy. An officer had command of a heavy park of artillery 
on that wing of the fort, and as the British column emerged 
from the forest, he saw its force, and opened a tremendous fire 
upon it. Our little guard, and their brave commander, were 
directly between the fort and the advancing column of the 
British army. They, of course, fell beneath the same fire that 
cut down the hostile column. As the story is related, General 
Brown was informed of the fact, and sent peremptory orders 
to the officer to cease his fire. To this order he paid no atten- 
tion, but kept up such a shower of grape and canister, that the 
British column was broken and scattered before they reached 
the fort, so that not a man scaled its walls. But the whole of 
our picket guard, with their commander, were sacrificed ; not 
a man survived. 

For this conduct the officer was arrested, and, on trial, 



PAYMENT FOR SLAVES. 311 

showed conclusively that the sacrifice of our own guard of 
thirty men was necessary to save the fort, and those in it. They, 
Sir, were freemen. Their lives were surrendered for the 
safety of the army. These five southern gentlemen who 
reported this bill, now insist that the widows and orphan 
children of those men shall contribute a portion of their sub- 
stance to pay for a southern slave, who, for the safety of his 
own master, as well as others, was sent out of the neighbor- 
hood. If there be a northern man in this body willing to lend 
his vote to consummate such an insult to the honor of the free 
States, let him stand forth and avow it. 

But, Sir, to come more immediately to the precise case 
before us, I refer gentlemen to the Southampton riots in 1832. 
The newspapers of that day informed us that slaves, and, 
indeed, colored freemen, were shot down in the streets, others 
sent to prison, and others sent out of the neighborhood. Shall 
northern men be taxed to pay for them? Certainly, if you 
pass this bill, we must expect to open the treasury to the 
slave-holders in all these and in ten thousand other cases. By 
virtue of this same power exercised at Southampton, General 
Jessup, in order to secure the safety of the people of Florida, 
sent this man Lewis, with the Indians, west of the Mississippi ; 
and now the master, instead of paying the expense of arresting 
this man, — instead of refunding to this government and to the 
people of Florida the losses he has occasioned by bringing this 
slave amon.g them, — instead of paying for the property this 
man destroyed, — he comes here, and demands that we should 
pay him a thousand dollars for preventing Lewis from hilling 
more people and destroying more property. 

I have now stated my own views in regard to the powers of 
General Jessup to send this man out of the neighborhood. If 
he possessed power to deal with him as with any other enemy, 
no man will urge that we are in law or justice bound to pay 
for him. Admitting, however, for the sake of the argument, 
that General Jessup had no right to deal with him as an enemy, 
but that he was bound, under the order of the War Depart- 
ment, to deliver him over as a slave ; that he disobeyed this 



312 PAYMENT FOR SLAVES. 

order, and sent him west upon his own responsibility, and in 
violation of his duty ; in such case, I ask, is there a member 
on this floor, who, for a moment, would suppose the people 
bound to pay for a slave taken by General Jessup, in violation 
of his duty, and of positive orders from the War Department ? 

Every member must be aware that the rules which control 
a public agent are the same as those which govern in private 
life. Suppose I employ a man to act as my agent. While he 
confines himself to the business on which he is authorized to 
act, I am bound in law and in justice by his contract. Sup- 
pose I employ my friend on my right to go and purchase a 
horse for me. He makes a contract for the horse in my name ; 
I am bound by it, and must perform it. But suppose he pur- 
chase a farm in my name ; no man would suppose me obliga- 
ted to take it. 

Military officers are the agents of government, to do all 
things pertaining to their office, and which come within the 
line of their duties. General Jessup was an agent to send out 
of Florida all enemies of the country ; but he was not our 
agent to send the friends of government west of the Mississippi. 
If he has done so, the act is his, not ours. It was unauthor- 
ized, and he alone is liable. Now I understand the gentleman 
from South Carolina (Mr. Burt) to urge that he was an enemy, 
and dangerous to the country. I admit the fact, and say that 
he should be treated as an enemy. But if he were not an 
enemy, then there is no claim on the government. 

But the committee are not content with urging that he was 
an enemy to the country, and dangerous. They suddenly 
change the argument, and say that he was taken for public use. 
An enemy to the nation is taken for public use / Well, Sir, the 
argument is ingenious. It never found a place in the mind of 
Grotius or Puffendorf, or of any writer upon the law of nations 
or the rights of government. But the point was adopted by 
the argument of the gentleman from South Carolina, and per- 
haps I ought to notice it. For what use was he taken ? To 
what use was he applied ? The gentleman admits the right to 
shoot or to hang him. Would not that have been as much a 



PAYMENT FOR SLAVES. 313 

" taking for public use " as it was to banish him ? The use of 
sending him out of the country was the preservation of the 
lives and property of the people. That would have been 
equally attained by shooting or hanging the negro. But the 
reply to this is, that he was property. "Well, I repeat, suppose 
he had been a rabid dog, or a vicious mule, killing people and 
destroying their property, and General Jessup had shot or 
chased him out of the country, to prevent him from killing his 
master or others, would the government have been liable ? 

Again ; it is said that, by the act of hiring, we admitted the 
slave to be property, and that the government is now estopped 
from denying that fact. We are bound to treat all arguments 
on this floor with respect. But to suppose that this obscure 
lieutenant, who, perhaps, never read a commentary on the Con- 
stitution, and who, I dare say, never dreamed that he was 
affecting, or doing any thing to affect, our rights or our duties ; 
I say, to suppose that his acts would estop Congress from main- 
taining the Constitution, or that such acts would have any 
weight whatever with this body, is a proposition which I will 
not detain the House to examine. He was our agent for the 
purposes of doing his military duty; but we never authorized 
him to legislate for us, or to give construction to our constitu- 
tional rights. Why, Sir, I may hire out my son or apprentice, 
or my hired servant ; but would that be an admission that they 
were my property ? Or, suppose I agree that the gentleman 
from South Carolina (Mr. Burt) shall attend the speaker to a 
given place ; does that imply that I hold him as property ? 
No, Sir ; the only fact implied is, that I have a right to receive 
the wages when the labor or duty is performed, according to 
my contract. In this case, the claimant agreed that Lewis 
should accompany the troops, and the officer agreed to pay the 
master twenty-five dollars per month. The claimant might 
have made the same arrangement in regard to any freeman as 
he did in regard to Lewis ; and when the labor was performed, 
he would have the same right to the money. But, in such 
case, would the government be obligated to pay him for such 
27 



314 PAYMENT FOR SLAVES. 

freeman ? No doubt the obligations would rest upon the hirer 
that now rest on the government, and no more. 

But the gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. Burt) says 
that the act of 1815, levying direct taxes, recognizes slavery as 
property. That law provides " that such tax shall constitute a 
lien upon the real estate, and upon all slaves of individuals 
upon whom said taxes shall be assessed." My presumption is, 
that this bill was drawn by some southern man, who did not 
reflect that slaves were less property under the Federal Con-> 
stitution than they were under the laws of the slave States. 
The gentleman does not pretend that, at the passage of that 
law, the question whether slaves were persons or property, was 
raised, or discussed, or thought of. I need not say that a bill 
passed sub silentio constitutes no precedent. In our courts of 
justice, the judge takes no notice of questions not made by the 
parties, nor do the proceedings of a court form any authority 
on points not raised nor discussed by counsel, nor examined by 
the court. 

The case of Depeyster, to which I referred, was a stronger 
case than that of the law of 1815. My friend from Pennsyl- 
vania, (Mr. Dickey,) as well as myself, stated that that case 
passed when no one knew it. I knew that my lamented friend 
(Mr. Adams) and myself both intended to oppose its passage, 
and we were both watching it ; but it got through when we 
were unconscious of it. Does any man, I will not say lawyer, 
suppose that its passage constitutes any precedent showing 
that slaves are property ? Yet this law of 1815, so far as we 
know, received no more attention (or at least that part of it 
relating to slaves) than did the act for the relief of Depeyster. 
It can, therefore, constitute no precedent. 

The force of a precedent consists in the respect which we 
pay to the judgment of a former Congress. It is therefore 
necessary, to give a precedent any force whatever, that the 
judgment of the tribunal should have been exercised upon the 
question, whether it be a judicial or legislative precedent. 
Thus, in each case that I have cited as precedents, either in 



PAYMENT FOR SLAVES. 315 

this House or in committees, the questions now under consider- 
ation were discussed, and deliberation had, and a judgment 
given upon the point before us. 

Now, Sir, let me say, with all due respect to southern gen- 
tlemen, that I challenge them to produce an instance in which 
this House, or the Supreme Court of the United States, or any- 
respectable court of any free State, has decided slaves to be 
property under the Federal Constitution, in any case where that 
question has been raised, discussed, or examined. I desire to 
see gentlemen come to a definite issue on this subject. I wish 
to meet them fairly and distinctly. They must admit that the 
framers of the Constitution intended to exclude from that 
instrument the idea that there could be property in man. To 
that point I intend to hold them. And I call upon them to 
meet the record of Mr. Madison, to which I have referred. 
Let them deny that record, or carry out the intentions of the 
framers of that instrument. 

The gentleman from South Carolina (Mr. Burt) says he 
" should like to know what was contemplated by that clause in 
the Constitution which stipulates for the surrender of fugitive 
slaves, unless it be that their owners hold property in them ? " 
I answer, that clause means just what it says. It gives to the 
holder of slaves the right to pursue and recapture them in a 
free State, precisely as it gives me the right to pursue and 
retake my apprentice, or my son, in any State to which he may 
escape. It no more admits the slave to be property, than it 
admits the apprentice or the minor to be property. I am tired 
of hearing this clause of the Constitution quoted to prove 
almost every doctrine advanced by southern men. Its provi- 
sions are of the most plain and obvious character. It merely 
provides for the recapture and return of slaves, and nothing 
more. 

But my hour has nearly expired. My constituents hold sla- 
very to be a crime of the deepest dye. The robbing a man of 
his money or property, or the seizing of his ship upon the high 
seas, we regard as grievous offences, which should exclude the 
perpetrator from human associations for the time being. But 



316 PAYMENT FOR SLAVES. 

we look upon those crimes as of small importance, when com- 
pared with that of robbing a man of his labor, his liberty, his 
social, his intellectual enjoyments ; to disrobe him of his 
humanity, to degrade and brutalize him. On this account we 
protest solemnly against being involved in the wickedness and 
in the crimes of that institution. To-day we are asked to pay 
our money for the liberty of our fellow man. We hold that he 
was endowed with that liberty by his Creator ; that it is impi- 
ous, and in the highest degree criminal, for a man, or for a 
government, to rob any portion of our race of their God-given 
rights. 

As the rej>resentative of a Christian and a moral constitu- 
ency, I deny the right of Congress to involve them or me in 
the support of such crimes. By our compact of Union, no 
such power is delegated to Congress. By the passage of this 
bill, we shall become slave-dealers ourselves, — traders in 
humanity. The people of our State shrink from the foul con- 
tagion. With Mr. Gerry, we hold that " we have nothing to 
do with slavery in the States, but we will be careful not to give 
it any sanction ; " with Mr. Madison, we hold that " it would be 
wrong to admit that there can be property in man ; " and with 
the signers of the Declaration of American Independence, we 
hold that it is a " self-evident truth, that all men are created 
equal." 

We believe our rights to enjoy these doctrines unmolested 
by this government are as clear and indisputable as are the 
rights of the slave States to deny them in theory and in prac- 
tice. We claim no superiority of privileges under the com- 
pact. We admit them, under the Constitution, to enjoy their 
slavery unmolested by Congress or by the free States. Its 
blessings and its curses, its horrors and its disgrace, are theirs. 
We neither claim the one, nor will we share in the other. We 
will have no participation in its guilt. " It is the object of our 
perfect hate." Southern gentlemen may continue to misrepre- 
sent us, by saying that we seek to interfere with that institution 
in the States ; but, thank God, we have obtained access to the 
public ear. The people of the free States now understand that 



PAYMENT FOR SLAVES. 317 

all our efforts, politically, are based upon the constitutional right 
of being exempt from its support. 

I am aware of the efforts now making by northern presses, 
letter-writers from this city, and editors who pander to the spirit 
of servility, to misrepresent my views, and assail my motives. 
Sir, let me say to those men, before Heaven, if they will come 
up to the work, unite their influence, and separate this govern- 
ment from the support of slavery and the slave-trade, and leave 
that institution where the Constitution placed it, — with the 
States in which it exists, — with gratitude to God, and with 
love and good-will to all my fellow men, I will retire from these 
halls to the obscurity of private life. 

Sir, I may, on the present occasion, deny the imputation that 
I wish to embarrass the friends of the incoming Administra- 
tion. Those who have done me the honor to observe my course 
in this hall for the last ten years, must do me the justice to say, 
that my efforts here have been against existing evils. I desire 
to see every member of every party lend his influence to sup- 
port the Constitution of my country, and the rights of human- 
ity. I war upon no party. I wish to see the people of the 
free States purified from the support, the crimes, the contagion 
of slavery. I would oppose any member, or any party, who 
seeks to uphold the slave-trade or slavery by Congressional 
laws, or lends his influence to continue within this district, or 
on the high seas, a commerce in human flesh. I know that the 
sympathies, the consciences, and the judgment of the people 
are with me. Recent events have demonstrated the power of 
truth. Its omnipotence is irresistible. It is rolling onward. 
No political paltering, no party evasions, no deceptions, no 
dodging of responsibility, will satisfy the people. No; gen- 
tlemen must come up to the work ; they must take their posi- 
tion upon the line of the Constitution, and maintain the rights 
of the free as well as of the slave States, or they will be over- 
whelmed by the indignation of a free and virtuous people. 

General Taylor and his friends will have an opportunity of 
gaining immortal honors, and of deserving and receiving the 
gratitude of the American people. Let them at once abolish 
27* 



318 PAYMENT FOR SLAVES. 

slavery and the slave-trade in this district, and upon the high 
seas; let this government cease to oppress and degrade our 
race ; let us cease to legislate for slavery ; let the powers and 
influence of government be exerted to promote human liberty, 
to elevate mankind in his moral and physical being ; and the 
honors of men, and the blessings of Heaven, and the gratitude 
of this and of coming generations shall be theirs. But if their 
influence be exerted to maintain slavery, — to continue this 
commerce in human flesh now carried on in this district, and 
upon the high seas, — to involve the people of the North in these 
transcendent crimes, — then the opposition of good men, the 
curse of Heaven, and the execrations of posterity, will be their 
reward ! 



MEXICAN WAR.* 



ITS EXPENSE — POSITION OF THE WHIG PAKTY — THEIR POSITION OF 1844 
— THEIR CHANGE — THEIR CANDIDATE — HIS POSITION — UNION OF THE 
WHIGS AND DEMOCRATS. 

[In 1844 the whig party took strong ground against the Mexican war, and the 
extension of slavery. In 1846, they changed their position and voted for the 
war; and in 1847, having a jnajority in the House of Eepresentatives, they 
voted to supply men and money to carry on the war. In 1848, they nominated 
General Taylor for President, without any declaration of principles. This led 
to a separation of a portion of that party from those who adhered to the policy 
of exerting the power of government to support slavery. The following speech 
was the first declaration in Congress that a portion of the whig party would 
not support General Taylor; and that a new party was forming, which would 
take its position in favor of a total separation of the Federal Government from 
all support of slavery.] 

Mr. Chairman, — I am not surprised at the amount of 
deficiency in the appropriations of last year. This war has 
proved more expensive than its friends expected. Twelve 
millions of dollars ought to defray the whole annual expense of 
our government. But it now only covers the deficit of one 
year. Efforts are made to place the responsibility upon the 
" whig party ; " for the reason, as it is said, that they have a 
majority in this body. I have long been an humble member 
of that party, and think I understand its principles. In 1844, 
the whigs were unanimously opposed to this war. They exe- 



* Speech on the bill to supply deficiency of appropriations for 1847. Deli- 
vered in Committee of the whole House on the State of the Union, June 30 , 
1848. 



320 MEXICAN WAR. 

crated it. Now a majority of this House sustain and approve 
the war. 

At that time the party opposed the extension of slavery ; 
now a majority of this House are evidently iu favor of that 
measure. The issues were made up on these questions, and 
the extension and perpetuation of slavery became the absorb- 
ing subject, which, like Aaron's rod, swallowed up all others. 
Our position was well denned. We then laid the foundation of 
our political faith upon the rock of the Constitution. When it 
was asserted in this hall that the Federal Government was 
bound to protect and uphold the slavery of the South, the 
whigs denied the doctrine. Such, too, was the case in the 
other end of the capitol. During the recess of Congress, Mr. 
Clay, the leader of the whigs, in a letter to the " Lexington 
Observer," declared " that Congress possessed no powers 
whatever over the institution of slavery ; that its existence, 
maintenance, and continuance, depended exclusively upon the 
power and authority of the several States in which it is 
situated." Thus was the position of our party, as well as that 
of our opponents, rendered distinct and obvious. A portion of 
the whig party will adhere to that position, let what may betide 
us. No seductions will entice us from it; and no array of 
influence will induce an abandonment of it. I now hazard 
the declaration, that on this principle of opposing all attempts 
of the Federal Government to extend and uphold that institu- 
tion, against all interference or connection with slavery beyond 
that which is provided for in the Constitution, is now based a 
party, or the germ of a party, that will at no distant clay become 
dominant in this nation. 

That party, call it what you may, will oppose all propagan- 
dised of slavery, and all attempts to throw its burdens, its dis- 
grace, or its guilt upon the people of the free States. The old 
issues between the parties are lost sight of; they are in fact 
forgotten. Who now speaks of a protective tariff? Who, in 
this hall, attempts to illustrate its benefits to the free labor of 
the North ? Or who complains of its burdens upon the slave 
labor of the South ? Who now occupies time on the subject 






MEXICAN WAE. 321 

of harbor or river improvements ? We have no funds for such 
purposes. They are absorbed in a war waged for the extension 
of slavery, and the President has indicated his intention to 
veto any bill for that purpose. No one alludes to a Bank of 
the United States ; and no one complains of the sub-treasury ; 
and the division of the funds arising from the sale of public 
lands is not spoken of. These issues are laid aside, and we 
are now altogether absorbed in the great question of extending 
and upholding slavery, and maintaining the war which has 
resulted from that policy. The old organizations are in a degree 
broken up ; the old lines of demarcation have become obscure 
and uncertain, whenever this subject is presented ; some who 
have been called whigs leave us, and some who have been 
called democrats now vote with us. New political associations 
are gradually forming. The trammels of party are breaking ; 
and no power can again unite either whig or democratic parties 
in any measure to extend slavery, or to uphold it. When this 
subject comes up, each party for the time being is disbanded. 

Where now is the democratic party in the State of New 
York? It is most effectually disbanded; such will soon be 
the case in all of the free States ; the attempts to lead them to 
the support of slavery, to extend it upon territory now free, 
has alarmed the honest and humane members of it ; they 
refuse longer to be made the dupes of the slave power. Like 
honest men, they have cast off their servile leaders ; they have 
thrown the old party issues to the four winds of heaven ; and, 
like true patriots, they are adopting the high and holy princi- 
ples of " man's inalienable rights " as the basis of their politi- 
cal action. I know it is usual for whigs to distrust and cast 
suspicion upon the political movements of those who have 
heretofore acted with the democratic party. I do not partici- 
pate in that feeling. In the last Congress there were good 
men and true belonging to the other side of this hall, and I trust 
there is a still greater number of them in this body now than at 
any former period. I cannot approve of their support of this 
war. I am compelled to judge them by the same rules by which 
I judge those who call themselves whigs. Believing the war 



322 MEXICAN WAR. 

unjust and barbarous, it follows, in niy judgment, that all who 
support it must be wrong, whether they be called whigs or 
democrats ; but, on the question of extending slavery, I regard 
a portion of the democratic party in all the free States as 
unalterably pledged against it ; and I think they will adhere to 
that position. 

The war in which we are engaged, is but a consequence of 
our efforts to extend slavery by the annexation of Texas. It 
was foretold by all who examined the subject. Mr. Clay 
declared annexation and war to be identical. The whigs did 
not cease to condemn it, from the first agitation of the subject 
of annexing Texasfc up to the 11th May, 1845, that ill-fated 
day, when most of our party, in the moments of excitement, 
voted to recognize this miserable war, brought on as it had 
been by the President. I mean no disrespect to those friends ; 
they were as sincere and as patriotic as those who differed 
from them. But they will permit me to say, that I regarded 
that vote as a surrender of our moral power. They felt con- 
strained to vote for that most obnoxious measure. And, sub- 
sequently, most of the whigs voted to give the President men 
and money to carry on this work of devastation and death. 

I would cast no reflections upon my political friends, but I 
must say, that I have ever regarded it as wholly inconsistent 
for whigs to condemn the war, and at the same time to lend 
their votes and influence to carry it on. The idea that gentle- 
men here are constrained to do wrong is, in my humble appre- 
hension, absurd and ridiculous. 

I fully concur in what was well said by my colleague, 
(Mr. Schenck,) that we ar*e following in the footsteps of our 
opponents. At the last session, they appropriated money, in 
their estimation sufficient to continue the work of bloodshed in 
Mexico up to the 31st June next. But the elections have 
changed the character of the House since that time. And the 
whigs nominally now control the business of this body. Has 
there been any change of 'policy by placing the power in whig 
hands? Not any. The bill before us appropriates twelve 
millions dollars for continuing the war. Now, Sir, if we pass 



MEXICAN WAR. 323 

this bill, where is the distinction between their measures and 
ours ? If we adopt their policy, ought we not also to adopt 
their name ? If there be no difference between them and us, 
why should we profess to constitute a different party ? "A 
rose would smell as sweet by any other name." If we look 
back to 1844, and say as we then said, that no whigs can sup- 
port this iniquitous war, we must say that the whig party is 
dissolved. 

Mr. Chairman, it is due to myself to say, that I never have, 
and I think I never shall, vote a dollar to carry on this war. 
I have too long and too ardently denounced it as unjust and 
wicked, to turn round now and support it. I am constrained 
to say that, so far as this war is concerned, it has become a 
matter of some difficulty with me to discriminate between 
whigs and democrats. Standing now as I did in 1844, unquali- 
fiedly opposed to the war, in all its phases, in its generals and in 
its details, I have seen a portion of this body, who stood with 
me at that time, leave the policy which then guided us, and go 
over to the support of measures which we then condemned. I 
repeat, that I impute to them no motives other than of patriot- 
ism ; but I may be permitted to say, that I have yet seen no 
cause for changing my position on this subject. If other gentle- 
men feel it their duty to sustain the war, they will of course 
do so. " To our own masters, we must each stand or fall." 

The Committee of Ways and Means have reported bills 
appropriating all the treasure demanded by the President for 
carrying on the war. They act as our agent ; and the whig 
party now stands before the country in the attitude of sustain- 
ing and continuing the war which they have so much denounced. 
I regard this as a false position. I do not think the whig party 
of the nation desire to take upon themselves the guilt and 
odium attached to the devastation of Mexico. I think a large 
majority of the whig members of this house would have been 
pleased to see bills reported appropriating all the means neces- 
sary to bring our army back to our own territory in safety. In 
that event, if enough of our party had felt disposed to unite 
with the democrats to change such bills, so as to grant the men 



324 MEXICAN WAK. 

and money necessary to continue the work of conquest, they 
could have done so. The responsibility would then have 
rested where it should rest — on those who intentionally sustain 
the war. But, as the facts now exist, the whig party have 
relieved the President and his party of their responsibility, 
and have taken it upon themselves. 

This state of things I had greatly desired to avoid. I fore- 
told its existence in December last, prior to the organization 
of this House ; and to my whig colleagues I expressed my 
determination to have no share in producing it. I was then 
conscious that the honorable gentleman who now fills the office 
of Speaker, if elected, would so constitute the Committee of 
Ways and Means, as to secure the reports of bills appropriating 
the necessary means to continue the work of rapine and mur- 
der in Mexico. I mention these things with perfect respect for 
the honorable Speaker, and the members composing the com- 
mittee to which I have alluded. I presume their motives to be 
pure, but I could not bring my mind to agree to this policy. 
Every sentiment of my heart was opposed to it. I was there- 
fore compelled to vote against the election of the honorable 
gentleman who now fills that office. I had denounced the 
President for involving us in a war which I deemed barbarous 
and criminal. Nor could I discover any good reason to believe 
that the work of cutting Mexican throats had become sanctified 
in the sight of Heaven by its continuance. With such feelings, 
I could not lend my vote to assist in electing any man to office 
who I believed would exert his official influence in favor of 
continuing this war. I then felt, and I now feel, that, had I 
voted for the election of any man, knowing that his official 
influence would be thus exerted, I should have involved myself 
in the guilt attached to the wholesale murders carried on in 
.Mexico. I refused to vote for the gentleman nominated, for 
the reason that I believed he would arrange the Committee of 
Ways and Means precisely as he has done ; and that the policy 
of the administration in regard to this war, would be sustained 
by the whig party, which would be thus made to assume its 
odium. 



MEXICAN WAR. 325 

Sir, I would not participate in such responsibility. I 
intended to lustrate myself, and the people whom I represent, 
from the guilt attached to the murder of our fellow beings in 
Mexico. When Pilate, a pagan governor, saw that the people 
were determined on shedding innocent blood, he took water and 
washed his hands, declaring himself exempt from the crime 
they were about to commit ; and shall I, a professing Christian, 
and representing a Christian people, hesitate to wash my hands 
of the crimes of this war ? No, Sir, never. 

In saying this, I speak for no other person than those whom 
I represent. I regard every life sacrificed in this war a mur- 
der, attended with all the moral guilt attached to that crime. 
That guilt, in my view, must rest upon all who aid in carrying 
on hostilities in Mexico ; and I wish it to be distinctly under- 
stood, that no party ties, nor party policy, can induce me to par- 
ticipate in such guilt. I would not leave the position which our 
whole party maintained in 1844, to unite with our opponents to 
sustain a war which we then so loudly condemned. If we were 
right in opposing it then, we must be wrong in supporting it 
now. " Men often change ; 'principles never." 

The whig party is also placed in a false position on another 
subject. "We have ever held, as a party,' that the Federal 
Government has no power over the institution of domestic 
slavery. As before stated, Mr. Clay, in 1844, denied that Con- 
gress possessed any powers in regard to slavery. I believed 
Mr. Clay to be correct in that position. Indeed, the whole 
whig party declared the doctrine true. I still adhere to that 
position as firmly as in 1844. But, Sir, look at your Commit- 
tee on the District of Columbia, and that upon the Judiciary. 
They are the organs of the whig party. To those committees 
we have sent vast numbers of petitions praying us to withdraw 
all support of the slave-trade, and to cease all support of sla- 
very in this district. But no response is made to those peti- 
tions. They are held in silence. The slave-trade is carried 
on here, as it were, under the very folds of our national flag. 
We see our servants seized in our very presence, ironed, gagged, 
and hurried to the slave market ; yet those committees remain 
28 



326 MEXICAN WAR. 

silent. No outrage upon humanity can extort from them a 
report, either in favor of this traffic or against it. I intend 
doing these gentlemen no injustice. But, Sir, we know, from 
the votes of this body given on different occasions, that the 
whig party has not been in favor of supporting this traffic in 
human flesh. A large majority of it, I believe, are opposed to 
it ; yet, before the country, we stand in the attitude of protect- 
ing that commerce which has so long disgraced the nation. Of 
this heaven-defying outrage upon the rights of a portion of our 
race, I am also exempt. It is due to myself and those whom I 
represent that I should say, I do not share in the responsibility 
of sustaining it. I was perfectly conscious that this state of 
things would follow the election of our present Speaker. I 
shall do that gentleman no injustice when I say, that I told my 
friends, before his nomination, that, if elected, he would so con- 
stitute those committees as to protect and sustain this infamous 
traffic. I do not impute to him any improper motive or design. 
He doubtless regards it as a duty ; but I was unwilling to vote 
for any man who would use his official powers for such pur- 
poses, either from principle or from policy. On this subject, 
we find whigs sustaining the slave-trade, and democrats voting 
against it. Party lines have become obscure on this question 
also. A portion of both parties desire to see the government 
separated from the support of such crimes. 

Sir, I believe the great body of the people of both parties in 
the free States abhor the slave-trade. They desire to be free 
from its crimes ; they detest its abominations, and will hold 
responsible those who prostitute the powers of the government 
to sustain it. 

Another important point has not escaped the notice of the 
public. While the whigs, as a party, have manifested the 
most determined hostility to the war, denouncing it as wicked, 
unjust, and barbarous, as an accumulation of crime beyond 
conception, they have been called on here to express their pro- 
found gratitude to those who have voluntarily engaged in this 
work of slaughtering our race. I am aware of the fine-drawn 
casuistry which teaches us to denounce the crime, while we 



MEXICAN WAR. 327 

praise those who commit it; to execrate the slaughter of 
women and children at Monterey and at Vera Cruz, while we 
tender a nation's gratitude to those who voluntarily guided 
and directed the butchery. I have been unable to discover the 
force of such reasoning. Probably I have not appreciated the 
argument ; certainly I cannot agree to the doctrine. One of 
the officers, to whom the thanks of Congress were thus ten- 
dered, was my personal and political friend ; one who had done 
much to save the nation from the horrors of war in 1839, 
when hostilities hovered over our north-eastern frontier. That 
was an elevated and noble example of philanthropy and patriot- 
ism ; one for which I would gladly have united in a vote of 
thanks. But when those officers went to Mexico to engage in 
devastating that country, in cannonading their cities, and in the 
slaughter of their people, they did so voluntarily ; there was 
no compulsion in the business. I think that a Roman firmness 
and unbending integrity should then have characterized their 
conduct. They should instantly have resigned their offices, 
refused to enter upon the work of butchering a foreign people, 
and retired to their homes, and received the approval of their 
consciences, the gratitude of all good men, and the smiles of 
Heaven. 

But, Sir, these officers went to Mexico, took charge of our 
armies, and became the instruments of carrying out the de- 
signs of ambitious rulers, and of executing deeds at the con- 
templation of which my soul shrinks back with horror. For 
those acts I felt no pulsation of gratitude. Had I voted for 
the resolutions, I should have belied my conscience, and done 
violence to truth. I had at first thought I would remain silent 
when the vote should be taken, but further consideration con* 
vinced me that it was my duty to vote against the resolutions. 
I was unwilling, by my silence, to encourage the thirst for 
military eclat which they were calculated to inspire. On this 
subject both parties fully united ; all party distinctions were 
lost sight of, and I found myself in the very extraordinary 
position of voting alone in this body. Even though my vote 



328 MEXICAN WAR. 

stands solitary upon the record, I feel willing that it should 
pass the test of an enlightened people. I have witnessed the 
baleful effects of a standing army. It has brought us into this 
war. Had we been destitute of an army, the President would 
have been unable to involve us in hostilities with Mexico. The 
nation is now sustaining an army in that country at an expense 
of one hundred and twenty-five thousand dollars per day. This 
sum is drawn from the hard earnings of our laboring people ; 
and what do they get in return ? Why, they subject the peo- 
ple of Mexico to our will. We who have declared that all 
men are created equal, "that to secure our natural rights, 
governments are formed amongst men, deriving their just pow- 
ers from the consent of the governed," now squander untold 
millions to give evidence of our want of sincerity in the pro- 
fessions we have made. We see the officers of the army on 
every street of this city, living at their ease, and at the ex- 
pense of those who toil for their daily bread. These things are 
inconsistent with republican institutions. Rather than vote for 
resolutions lauding our military officers for shedding the blood 
of our fellow men, I would vote to bring back the fifty thou- 
sand troops from Mexico, and disband them. I would have 
them return to civil life ; I would have each earn his own sup- 
port, and by his labor contribute something to the general 
wealth of the nation. The army is a cancer upon the body 
politic. It is striking its fibres into the vital parts of society, 
and extending its virus into the veins and arteries of the 
government ; and, if continued, must sooner or later dissolve 
our institutions. 

On the 4th July last, at an encampment far in the interior of 
Mexico, at a meeting of the officers of our army, one of their 
number was nominated for the highest office in the gift of the 
American people. Thus early in the history of this nation has 
an attempt been made by the army to dictate to the people a 
President, — to send us from the camp a man to guide our 
ship of state, — one whose hands are dripping with human 
gore, — so that when he shall lay his fingers upon the book to 



MEXICAN WAR. 829 

take the oath of office, they will leave the sacred volume pol- 
luted with the blood of innocence. Are such things becoming a 
moral, a Christian people ? 

Yet both political parties vote resolutions which in their ten- 
dency serve to encourage our citizens to leave the peaceful 
vocations of civil life, and enter the army. I regard the policy 
wrong, and its influence deleterious. All such votes of our 
party paralyzes our moral power, and takes from us the ability 
to do that good for our country which we might otherwise 
effect. I think our legislation should be placed upon moral 
grounds ; that we should here, in our official acts, adhere to the 
same morality that we practise in private life. I do not know 
that it is more criminal in the sight of Heaven for a man in 
private life to lend his counsel and influence to shed innocent 
blood, than it is for him in this hall to vote to sacrifice the lives 
of hundreds and thousands of innocent people. If a man in 
private life lends his counsel or his influence to shed the blood 
of his fellow man, he is hanged as unworthy of longer associat- 
ing with human beings ; but if he voluntarily enters the army, 
and goes to Mexico, and there aids in slaying hundreds of men, 
women, and children, who never injured us or our nation, why, 
Sir, we tender him the thanks of Congress ; we express to 
him our nation's gratitude. 

Mr. Chairman, this morality will not stand the test of 
conscientious scrutiny. Our political morality is certainly of 
doubtful character. No man dares practise in private life upon 
the principles which guide our votes in this hall. I am aware, 
Sir, that it is said that the public mind is not prepared to adopt 
the same morality in our legislation which we practise at home. 
I answer, that fact depends upon us who act for the public. 
Let us but rigidly adhere to the dictates of a pure morality 
here, and I entertain no hesitation that the people will justify 
us. I do not believe that those who sent us here, intended 
that we should leave our morality at home, or that we should 
forget our moral responsibility while engaged in the work of 
legislation. 

In what I say against war, I allude only to foreign wars, — * 
28* 



330 MEXICAN WAR. 

to wars of conquest and aggression. I make no allusion to 
wars of defence ; I believe them justifiable and proper. Self- 
defence is the first law of nature ; and were I a Mexican as I 
am an American, I would meet your army at the frontier with 
a sword in one hand and a torch in the other, and by every 
means which God has given me, I would defend my country. 

When, in March 1843, I, together with twenty other whig 
members of this body, including the venerable member whose 
shrouded seat reminds us of the bereavement which our coun- 
try has recently sustained,* by a public manifesto, called the 
attention of the people to the annexation of Texas as the com- 
mencement of a system of conquest, which must in time prove 
fatal to our institutions, we meant what we said. It is true 
that our efforts to arouse the public mind to the evils which we 
clearly foresaw, proved useless. Our warnings, like those of 
Cassandra, were not credited ; they fell dead upon the ears of 
the people. But we now see our predictions fully verified. 
Sir, I must have read the history of our race in vain, if this 
fostering of a military spirit does not bring upon our nation 
consequences of the most dangerous character. I am aware that 
it is said, these resolutions of thanks were nothing more than 
a scheme of President-making, which is regularly manifested 
in this hall once in every four years. And I think their pre- 
sentation was evidently designed to carry out the nomination 
made in Mexico, to which I have alluded. 

From an early period of the session, we have heard gentle- 
men, in their speeches, lending aid and giving influence to this 
plan of foisting upon the people, a President whose only 
recommendation is his military fame. If military service qual- 
ifies a man for the highest office of government, it is easy to 
see that our minor offices will be filled with the same class ; 
and the day is near when our government must become a 
" military republic." When I have heard gentlemen speaking of 
the popularity of the distinguished officer to whom I have 



* After the death of Hon. John Quincy Adams, the House ordered his seat 
and desk to be covered with crape during that session. 



MEXICAN WAR. 



331 



alluded, and of that political millennium when all parties are to 
unite in his support, I have desired to inquire what are the 
principles on which he will, if elected, administer the govern- 
ment ? 

The most ultra supporters of free trade, and the most deter- 
mined adherents of a protective tariff, are to unite in support 
of this distinguished military officer for President. Each 
knows that he or his allies, must find themselves deceived after 
the election. But each is hoping it will not be himself, and 
each rejoicing in the thought that it will be those acting with 
him. Neither of them has any evidence of General Taylor's 
real views ; but each is willing to bring his political principles 
into common stock, and hazard the chance of drawing out 
those of his former opponent. They are willing to stake their 
whole political fortunes upon the opinions of General Taylor, 
each thinking he is to overreach the other, and rejoicing in the 
expectation of success ; confident that if he succeeds in elect- 
ing his man, he will surely gain a President, if he lose his prin- 
ciples. 

Meetings are called in Philadelphia and New York and 
other cities for the purpose of directing the popular attention to 
him as a candidate. While here, before the country, no friend 
of his can inform us what his views are. This is a most extra- 
ordinary state of the political parties. Both whigs and demo- 
crats are in favor of General Taylor, not because they know 
his political sentiments to be right, but because they do not 
know whether they are right or wrong. They support him, 
not because they know his views, but because they do not 
know them. Yet, Sir, under this state of things, it is said that 
he is a whig. I deny it, and call for the evidence. Where is 
the proof? What evidence have you of the fact? What pub- 
lic act in his whole life has demonstrated him to be a whig ? 
When or where did he give a whig vote, or advocate whig 
doctrines ? When or where did he ever explain his sentiments, 
and show them to be such as are held by the whig party ? I 
presume General Taylor to be an honest and an honorable 
man ; but we have had some experience on this subject. 



332 MEXICAN WAR. 

John Tyler called himself a whig. Men in this hall called 
" whigs," voted for the annexation of Texas. So, too, in the 
other end of the capitol. Men calling themselves whigs vote to 
sustain this war, and are in favor of extending our territory, 
and of carrying slavery upon soil now free. Is General Taylor 
such a whig ? If not, what sort of a whig is he ? Let us know 
something about him. We do not wish to be led blindfolded 
to his support. We will take no leap in the dark. I am aware 
that reports are constantly circulated that he is going to declare 
his whig principles hereafter. Very well; let us know his 
principles, and then ask our support for him. But do not 
insult us by asking us to vote for him, and leave us afterwards 
to learn his sentiments. Again ; it is said that certain highly 
respectable whigs assert that General Taylor is a whig. If he 
be such, he surely is not afraid to explain his doctrines. These 
general averments mean nothing. They explain nothing. On 
this subject he says, he " will not be the exponent of the 
principles of any party" Of course he will not be the expo- 
nent of whig doctrines. If not, then I cannot support him. I 
shall adhere to my whig sentiments, until I become satisfied 
that they are erroneous ; then I will abandon them. But, 
while I remain a whig, I will vote for no man who refuses to 
pledge himself in favor of freedom, and against extending sla- 
very. That, Sir, has been a fundamental doctrine of our 
party, and I will not surrender it. 

Mr. Chairman, it is not given us to know the future ; that 
is wisely hidden from our view ; but I think I speak the senti- 
ments of those whom I represent, when I say to this House 
and to the country, we shall not be misled in our votes for Pres- 
ident. Let others do as they please. We shall not abandon 
our position so long maintained against the annexation of ter- 
ritory ; against extending slavery ; against conquest ; against 
aggression ; against war. Against all these we shall interpose 
our utmost influence. 



RELATION OF THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT 
TO SLAVERY.* 



POSITION OS 1 SOUTHERN STATESMEN — OB JECTS TOR WHICH THIS GOVERN- 
MENT WAS FORMED— ADDRESS OF SOUTHERN MEMBERS EXAMINED — ITS 
DOCTRINES EXPOSED — RIGHTS OF THE PEOPLE OF THE FREE STATES — 
THEIR DUTIES IN REGARD TO FUGITIVE SLAVES — THE DOMESTIC SLAVE- 
TRADE— COURSE OF THE SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, 
AND DECEPTIONS OF THE WHIG PARTY EXPOSED — OBJECTS OF THE FREE 
DEMOCRACY STATED — THEIR COURSE VINDICATED — PROGRESS OF THE 
CAUSE OF LIBERTY. 

[The question whether the powers of the Federal Government should he 
exerted to sustain liberty, or prostituted to the support of slavery, had been 
pressed for some years, until, in 1848, the vote of the free democracy appeared to 
have alarmed the slave power. In the session of Congress which followed the 
presidential election of that year, some twenty southern members of Congress 
published an address to the people of the South, complaining that their slaves 
were permitted to escape ; that the people of the North discussed the institution 
of slavery and the slave-trade ; that they were endeavoring to abolish both in 
the District of Columbia, and to prohibit the latter as it was carried on upon 
our southern coast. Efforts were made to get an address answering it, signed 
by an equal number of northern members. This failed, however, and Mr. Gid- 
dings expressed his own views in the following speech.] 

Mr. Chairman, — A treaty of peace has been entered into 
between this government and Mexico ; and we are called on to 
grant the necessary means to carry it into effect. For that 
purpose, the bill under consideration has been presented. The 
subject is one of a comprehensive character, and opens up a 
wide field of debate. Gentlemen who have preceded me have 

* Speech on the bill making appropriations to carry into effect our Treaty 
with Mexico. Delivered in Committee of the whole House, February 17, 1849. 



534 RELATION OF THE 

availed themselves of this latitude of remark. But some of 
them have refused to be corrected on matters of fact and of 
law. when other members believed them in error. I regard 
speeches made in this body proritable. only so tar as they elicit 
truth : and will thank any gentleman to correct me upon mat- 
ters of fact or of law. as I pass along in my remarks. If I 
labor under error. I desire to be set right at the earliest mo- 
ment, before I impress that error upon any other human being. 
The bill before us has presented to us the important ques- 
tion of the relation which this government holds to the institu- 
tion of slavery. The exclusion of that institution from our new 
territories, sustaining it in this district, and the maintenav 
the slave-trade here, have all been ably and eloquent", 
bated. I have no hope of bringing any new views before the 
committee, although I may perhaps present those already 
advanced in a connection different from those who have gone 
before me. 

On that ill-fated day, when this House adopted the 
which had been commenced by the Executive. I saw. or thought 
I clearly saw. the present difficulties into which we ham 
precipitated. These difficulties I pointed out in an humble 
speech which I had the honor of delivering to this body on the 
day following. During the whole period of hostilities, Wf 
conscious that it was the design of the Executive to acquire 
territory, principally for the purpose of spreading th 
human bondage over it. Gentlemen of the two great political 
parties then united in sustaining and continuity 
our present position in full view before them. During the 
progress of the war. we constantly cautioned our southern 
friends, we assured them that, if territory were obtain-: 
should not consent to abolish freedom therein. They now 
. of the amount of southern blood shed in that war. It 
heir own folly. They knew that our arr. - gluing 

for the purpose of bringing these questions before us for deci- 
sion. Thej dow talk of its dangers. Sir. they shook] 

ted on that before the dec". f war: U 

have listened to our advice, and avoided the dangers which we 



FEDERAL GOVERNMENT TO SLAVERY. 

so distinctly pointed out. It' our maintenance ot liberty be 
- that danger has now become unavoidable. Wc 
hope to meet it in a manner as becomes freemen. 

In the argun. southern gentlemen, there seems to be 

a fundamental error common to them all. They assume that 
! _ vernment was founded for the support ry. They 

insist that southern oppression is as much entitled to the encour- 
agement a:. K I I IIMI III ■! 
the lil - :he people for whom we legisla: seem 
to have overlooked the great which the found* - 
institutions had in v: -ign stands recorded on every 

f our history : they left perpetual monuments on 
battle neld of the Revolution, proclaiming, in unmistakable lan- 

. their hostility to oppression, and their devotion t 
dom. JN — : :\r any period of the world, were more 

inveterately op; - -".avery than were the founders of this 

government. In setting forth the reasons which induced them 

/.rate from the mother country, and to found an inde- 
pende: - _ lared that the bjeete of g 

ment were to secure the lives and liberties of the peoj I: 

was hostil: scription which impelled 

them to action. 

:y argument, ther-. 1 on the assumption t: 

at or in any manner, to shape our legislation 
for the encouragement or main: ;:* slavery, m 

course be erroneous. I: we cany out in good faith the inten- 
ho framed our institut : :e our 

energies to the support and encouragement of freedom, limiting 
our efforts in th> I by the Cons:- inter- 

ith slavery within the S tea But to eneourag 

tee even there, would be a violation of /.eiple 

which controlled the action of those who achieved our inde- 
penc those who framed our Constitution. 

Her is the precise point on which th 

w and the supporters of liberty differ. We demand that 
our whole legislation shall be in favor of freedom, of justice 



336 RELATION OF THE 

and humanity ; they insist that we are to place slavery, injus- 
tice, and crime upon the same level, and to bestow upon each 
the same attention and encouragement. Differing thus as to 
the essential elements of our compact, it were impossible for us 
to arrive at the same conclusions in our arguments. The con- 
troversy is therefore radical. It involves the most vital princi- 
ples of our association. 

Of all the erroneous sayings common to our country, none is 
more unfounded than the very common assertion that " slavery 
is guaranteed by the Federal Constitution." We hear it 
repeated in this hall, and we read it in official documents, and 
gentlemen appear to regard it as an established maxim, by 
which we are to guide our legislation. I have often requested 
those who repeat this assertion, to point me to the article, sec- 
tion, or clause of the Constitution, which guarantees slavery. 
I most respectfully made the inquiry, in the presence of the 
House, of the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Meade) who sits 
opposite ; but he failed to name the clause, or section, or arti- 
cle. 

Now, Sir, I desire to elict truth, and to expose error. I am 
surrounded by the ablest statesmen of the South, by men who 
insist that slavery is thus guaranteed to them. I therefore 
respectfully desire any one of them now to inform this body 
and the country on what clause of the Constitution they rely 
to sustain the assertion to which I have alluded. To enable 
any one to do that, I. now proffer to him the floor. 

[Mr. Giddings here paused for some moments, and then 
resumed.] 

Mr. Chairman, here is a most important error, either on 
my part, or on the part of those who assert that the Constitu- 
tion guarantees slavery. If wrong, I desire to be corrected 
now, before this body, and before the American people. I call 
on gentlemen, in respectful terms, to show the grounds of their 
faith on this point. They sit in silence. No one is willing to 
hazard his reputation by attempting it. Sir, there is no such 
guaranty. The pretence is entirely without foundation. I 



FEDERAL GOVERNMENT TO SLAVERY. 337 

therefore repeat, that the proper constitutional attitude of this 
government is in favor of liberty, and opposed to every form 
of oppression. 

The doctrine, that we are bound to encourage and perpetuate 
slavery, is of recent origin. It was never asserted until 1843. 
Prior to that period, the doctrine which I have laid down was 
admitted by statesmen from all portions of the Union. An 
attempt was then made to change the fundamental principles of 
our government, and to transform it into a slave-holding, a 
slave-sustaining confederacy. The great apostle of southern 
slavery stood forth as the advocate of this new theory. He 
went out of his way to argue the humane character of slavery 
in his official correspondence, and to point out the dangers of 
freedom to the colored race. He went farther, and endeavored 
to show that it was the duty of this government to uphold, 
extend, and perpetuate an institution abhorred by nearly all 
civilized nations. He, Sir, is a bold and honest statesman. 
He speaks his thoughts, and leaves no doubts as to his position. 
For this, I honor him. He was born and educated in a land 
of slavery. His interest has at all times been identified with 
that institution. His prejudices are in favor of it. It is inter- 
woven as it were with his very existence. This is his misfor- 
tune ; for that I will not reproach him. This new doctrine 
was carried into practice by the annexation of Texas. The 
war and conquest which followed, and the present efforts to 
appropriate our Mexican territory to the blighting curse of 
slavery, has precipitated upon us the important questions now 
pending. These circumstances have aroused the northern people 
to examine their rights. Southern aggressions have accom- 
plished a work which northern philanthropy attempted in vain. 
A portion of our northern people have taken their position 
distinctly in favor of separating this government from all inter- 
ference with slavery in the States, and of hostility to it in all 
places where we have the power to legislate upon the subject. 

This position of northern men has called forth a convention 
of southern statesmen. They have issued an address to the 
people of the South. Upon that address I propose to bestow 
29 



338 RELATION OP THE 

a few remarks. I wish to approach it with no feelings other 
than a desire to ascertain truth. Those gentlemen evidently 
think their rights are invaded. They are dissatisfied, and have 
sent forth an address stating their grievances. As a member 
of this body, as a lover of justice, it becomes my duty to 
inquire into the cause of discontent, if it exists among any por- 
tion of the people, either North or South; and if any just 
cause of dissatisfaction is found, we ought at once to remove 
it. This is a government of and for the people. It should be 
ministered to the satisfaction of all, so far as may be compati- 
ble with justice and the Constitution. 

With these feelings, I cannot but regret the attempts which 
are made to array unmeaning prejudices against those southern 
members who constitute the Convention alluded to. It has 
been called a " Disunion Convention," a " Hartford Conven- 
tion," and other terms of reproach have been applied to it. 
We ought to use only the arguments of truth and justice. 
Those gentlemen not only possessed the right to meet and com- 
pare views and deliberate, but if they felt that the rights of 
their people were invaded, it was their duty to take such con- 
stitutional course as they deemed best calculated to obtain 
justice for their constituents. I have no doubt they were 
prompted by these desires. 

The imputation of improper motives constitutes no answer 
to the charges they make. To say that the rights of the North 
have been trampled upon, will constitute no legitimate reason 
for withholding justice from the South. Suppose that, under 
merely imaginary wrongs, they have contemplated a dissolution 
of the American Union, we should, nevertheless, treat them 
kindly, and by the force of reason and the presentation of 
truth, endeavor to set them right. We should bear in mind 
that oppression, a disregard of our rights, caused our fathers 
to dissolve the union between Great Britain and these United 
States ; indeed, we all hold " that whenever any form of govern- 
ment becomes destructive " to the happiness of the people, " it 
is their right to alter or to abolish it. Our first duty is, to 
carry out and maintain the constitutional rights of each portion 



FEDERAL GOVERNMENT TO SLAVERY. 339 

of the Union ; our next duty is, to examine into and remove 
all just cause of complaint. The most humble citizen is entitled 
to a patient hearing in this body. 

Now, Sir, for a moment, let us look into this address, and 
ascertain why dissatisfaction exists among our southern friends. 

The general cause of complaint is, that this National Govern- 
ment has failed to secure and encourage oppression; that 
under its administration men are rending the chains that have 
bound them for ages; that they are rising from a state of 
degradation, and resuming the rights with which God endowed 
them. 

We of the free States regard this as the best of all possible 
arguments in favor of the Union. We look upon it as carry- 
ing into practice the very objects for which it was formed. 
These gentlemen, however, evidently think it was formed, not 
for the purpose of encouraging liberty, but to uphold slavery. 
Thus I am again brought to this point of divergence, men- 
tioned at the commencement of my remarks. Southern men 
holding this doctrine shape their legislation to the support of 
slavery, believing that the legitimate object of our association; 
while we of the North direct our efforts to the promotion of 
freedom, believing that to be the design for which our govern- 
ment was instituted. Thus we start in different directions, and 
while we travel, we shall of course increase the distance 
between us. 

This address will serve in a great degree to inform the coun- 
try of the true issues between the advocates of slavery and 
those who are laboring to promote the cause of human rights. 
We hope that southern men will no longer deal in vague gen- 
eralities. We rejoice to see them in this address come down 
to distinct specifications. This enables us to meet them under- 
standingly, and to compare our views on specific points. 

They first complain, that we lend them no aid in the arrest 
of their fugitive slaves. They evidently think that by the 
terms of our compact we are bound to aid the slave-holder in 
arresting the bondman who flees from oppression. On this 



340 RELATION OF THE 

point we are not left without definite information of the inten- 
tion of those who framed the Constitution. 

When Mr. Butler, of South Carolina, moved, in the Conven- 
tion that framed the Constitution, an amendment making it the 
duty of the free States to arrest and deliver up fugitive slaves 
in the same manner that we are bound to arrest and deliver up 
fugitives from crime, Mr. Willson, of Pennsylvania, objected 
that such a provision would involve the people of the free 
States in the expense of arresting such fugitive slaves ; and the 
motion was withdrawn. 

Mr. Madison, in his history of the formation of the Consti- 
tution, gives us this information. South Carolina did not then 
hold the doctrine now maintained by her most distinguished 
statesmen. Such claim was then spurned by northern men, 
and was abandoned by those of the South. Our obligations 
are embraced in the following clause of the second section of 
the fourth article : 

" No person held to service or labor in one State, and fleeing into another, 
shall, in consequence of any law or regulation therein, be discharged from 
such service or labor; but shall be delivered up on claim of the party to whom 
such service or labor may be due." 

These are our stipulations. We are to pass no law, make no 
regulation by which the person escaping shall be discharged. 
Our duty thus far is negative. We are not to act ; we are to 
refrain from all action, to leave master and slave to themselves. 

The latter part of the clause says, " he shall be delivered up 
on claim of the person to whom such service or labor may be 
due." How delivered up ? This question is distinctly an- 
swered by the Supreme Court of the United States, in the case 
of Prigg v. The Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. They say 
he is to be delivered up in the same manner that we deliver up 
our friends to the civil officer in our own State. We are bound 
to permit the master to take him wherever he finds him. We 
must not secrete him from the master. We must not defend 
him against the master ; nor are we to rescue him from the 
master's custody after he shall have taken him. This is the 



FEDERAL GOVERNMENT TO SLAVERY. 341 

way in which he is to be delivered up, according to the high 
tribunal which is authorized to give construction to the Consti- 
tution ; and it is worthy of remark that a majority of the Court 
making this decision were slave-holders. They have deter- 
mined our duties ; I believe them in strict accordance with the 
intentions of those who framed the Constitution. These slave- 
holding judges do not pretend that this government, or the peo- 
ple of the free States, are bound to encourage or sustain sla- 
very ; on the contrary, they solemnly declare that our whole 
duty is to abstain from secreting, defending, or rescuing the 
slave. These obligations we observe to the very letter. They 
may have been violated by individuals. I have heard and read 
of cases where citizens of my own State have been convicted 
of violating these stipulations, and have suffered the legal 
penalties attached to such violation. 

It is proper, on such occasions as the present, that we should 
speak with perfect frankness. I therefore remark, that our 
people consider these obligations as restraining the exercise of 
our moral duties. They therefore very properly refuse to go 
farther than is required by the Constitution. Their sympa- 
thies are with the slave, — such is the ordained law of the 
human intellect. We cannot suppress the feelings of our 
nature ; we cannot look with indifference upon the panting 
fugitive as he flies from bondage ; we will not do it. We re- 
ceive him into our houses, we feed and clothe him, and treat 
him as a man. We inform him, teach him his rights, and point 
him to that immortality that awaits him. Sir, our people 
know their constitutional obligations on this subject. It is use- 
less to say to them that it is their duty to assume the character 
of bloodhounds, and give chase to him who is fleeing from a 
land of chains and tears. No, Sir, they have neither sympa- 
thy nor respect for the slave-catcher. We look upon him as a 
moral pestilence, a legalized pirate; we will not admit him to 
our dwellings; we drive him from our premises; we regard 
him as unworthy to associate with any portion of our race. 

I understood the gentleman from Indiana, (Mr. Thompson,) 
and the gentleman from Pennsylvania, (Mr. Brown,) and my 
29* 



342 RELATION OF THE 

colleague (Mr. Taylor) to say, that in their districts the master 
who pursues his slave is treated with hospitality and respect. 
They further said their people aided the master in tracking out 
the trembling object of his pursuit. It is due to candor that I 
should assure southern gentlemen, that no such beings reside in 
my district. They would find no associates there. In the 
language of that eminent patriot, Mr. Gerry, he hold that " we 
have nothing to do with slavery in the States ; but we will be 
careful to lend it no sanction." We rejoice to see our fellow 
men who have been subjected to all that is wrong and barbar- 
ous and cruel, breathing the air of freedom, and wending their 
way to a land of safety. Nor will we interpose the slightest 
obstacle to their escape ; but we will lend them all the aid in 
our power, without violating the Constitution or laws of the 
land. 

This address further complains that the people of the North 
discuss the subject of slavery ; that debating clubs examine 
into its demerits ; and that members on this floor denounce it 
as wrong, as destructive to the best interests of mankind ; and 
that the newspaper press is left untrammeled by a censorship. 

This feeling did not exist when the framers of the Constitu- 
tion solemnly declared, "that Congress shall make no law 
abridging the freedom of speech or of the press." The found- 
ers of our government had no idea of rendering the press sub- 
servient to slavery. Deeming it one of the bulwarks of liberty, 
they placed its freedom beyond the power of Congress. They 
had no thoughts of sealing the lips of freemen, or of members 
of Congress, in order to uphold and continue the slavery of the 
South. 

Yet it is a lamentable truth, that for a time these rights 
were surrendered, ingloriously surrendered by northern timid- 
ity. Yes, in servile obedience to slave-holding dictation, for 
a time we established a vitiated state of public sentiment 
throughout the whole North. Fifteen years since, it was 
regarded as disreputable to discuss the demerits of slavery in 
our social circles. Our pulpits were silent in regard to the 
most heaven-daring crimes when connected with southern 



FEDERAL GOVERNMENT TO SLAVERY. 343 

oppression. Our presses dared not speak the language of 
freedom ; and here, in this hall, a tyranny more absolute and 
unrelenting than exists in any deliberative body in the civilized 
world, held undisputed sway. I speak with some feeling on 
this subject. I witnessed that tyranny; Sir, I felt it. For 
years I sat here under the inexorable rule of the slave power ; 
reproached, assailed, insulted, and driven from my seat, be- 
cause I insisted upon my right, as an American statesman, to 
speak the sincere convictions of my heart. 

But, Sir, after years of toil, of solicitude, and of responsi- 
bility, we have regained the freedom of speech. Do not gen- 
tlemen know that we found our right to speak our thoughts 
both here and elsewhere upon the Constitution, upon the very 
rock of our political salvation ? Do they desire again to seal 
our lips ? Do they complain that truth spoken here excites 
their slaves to strive for freedom? I rejoice to hear such 
tidings. Would that I were able, from this forum, to make 
every bondman in the nation hear me. I would teach them 
their rights, and if truth could instantly effect it, I would, 
before I resume my seat, strike the chains from every slave in 
the wide universe. 

I am perfectly aware that these gentlemen are correct, when 
they assure the country that these discussions are constantly 
weakening and relaxing the cords by which the slaves are 
bound. I rejoice at it. Truth is doing its perfect work. Jus- 
tice is beginning to assert her rights. The voice of humanity 
is listened to. Our press of the North is beginning to speak 
out. The people talk of slavery as they do of other great 
iniquities. Truth and righteousness are now preached from 
our pulpits. "While Turks and Tartars denounce the sins of 
slavery, shall Americans keep silence ? "While the followers 
of Mohammed are purifying themselves from its crimes, shall 
Christians uphold and encourage its God-provoking iniquities ? 
Here, in this city, in every street, we meet our brother man, 
borne down, trampled upon, and held in the most abhorrent 
degradation. From the windows of this hall, we witness the 
barracoons, those legalized hells, established by our laws, and 



344 RELATION OF THE 

now sustained by this body. And shall we keep silence ? "We 
possess the moral and constitutional right to speak and print 
whatever shall conduce to the elevation of our race. Duty to 
our fellow men, and obedience to God, require the exercise of 
those rights. They will never be surrendered. 

Those gentlemen also complain that we regard slavery as 
sinful and wicked. I presume at this day it would be super- 
fluous to argue that any act or institution which detracts from 
the happiness of mankind, or inflicts misery and suffering upon 
any portion of our race, except as a punishment for crimes, is 
opposed to the design of our Creator, and in violation of his 
law. I believe this may be regarded as an admitted principle. 
How is it with slavery ? How does the civilized world regard 
it? How have we as a nation regarded it? When, in 1804, 
the semi-barbarians of Tripoli seized and enslaved our people, 
did we not regard it as sinful ? 

By the most accurate data we can obtain, the number of 
human lives sacrificed upon the sugar, cotton, and rice planta- 
tions of the South, amounts annually to more than twenty 
thousand. These murders are effected by driving the slaves so 
hard as to render their average existence upon those planta- 
tions from five to seven years. And will southern gentlemen 
assert that this worse than savage barbarity is innocent? Does 
our religion teach this bloody code ? Sir, happy would those 
slaves feel if they could escape from professed Christians, 
whose hands are dripping with human gore, to the protection 
of the most unrelenting despotisms of the Old World ; or, 
could they even fall into the hands of the savage Arabs of 
Morocco, they would regard it as an unspeakable improvement 
of their condition. Look at the victims of our domestic slave- 
trade ! Mark the agony, the horror, the transports of grief 
which they suffer! Listen to their sighs, their groans, and 
wailings ! Do you believe that a holy, pure, and righteous 
God, approves the infliction of such suffering ? Sir, these gen- 
tlemen are correct, when they assert that we regard slavery as 
a sin. We look upon it not only as wicked and sinful, but as 
compounded of the worst of crimes. It robs men of their 



FEDERAL GOVERNMENT TO SLAVERY. 345 

labor ; it steals from theni their domestic and intellectual enjoy- 
ments; it degrades, brutalizes, and murders them. For my 
own part, I can conceive of no greater crime than that of sla- 
very. It is on that account that the Christian world are opposed 
to it, 

Another and principal cause of complaint set forth in this 
address, is the expected exclusion of slavery from our newly 
acquired territory. In establishing a government there, we 
have an object by which we are guided. What is it ? The 
answer is given in the American Declaration of Independence : 
" Governments are instituted among men to secure the enjoy- 
ment of life and liberty." Northern men are now ready and 
willing to form such a government in California; but our 
southern friends insist that a government shall be established 
there by which a portion of the people may be robbed of those 
rights, may be brutalized, disrobed of their humanity. We 
reply, that such an act would be vitally opposed to the objects 
for which our Union was formed, at war with the principles of 
justice, of humanity, and the Constitution. This subject, how- 
ever, has been so fully argued by others, as well as by myself, 
on former occasions, that I will not detain the committee longer 
upon it. I will merely add, that the people of the North have 
examined and considered this subject, and, I think, have made 
up their judgments in regard to it. Their motto is, " -ZVb slave 
territory, — no more slave States." 

I again remark, that this address in its general aspect, and 
in each and every particular, is founded upon the erroneous 
assumption that this government is bound to regard slavery 
with favor, and to uphold and encourage it ; while we of the 
North hold that the ultimate design of our Constitution is un- 
yielding hostility to slavery, and every species of oppression. 

It is this error into which southern men have so generally 
fallen, that leads us to differ in relation to the abolition of sla- 
very in this district. By our law of 1801, we took possession 
of this territory, and extended over it the 1 laws of Maryland. 
In that act we declared that the laws of that State then in 
operation here, should remain and continue in force. Among 



346 RELATION OF THE 

those laws was the entire slave code of that State. This we 
adopted with the others as laws of the district. By this enact- 
ment, they became " acts of Congress" They are to this day 
sustained and made law by this act of 1801. It is, therefore, 
solely by virtue of this act of 1801, that slavery exists in this 
district. It is that which sustains the slave-trade. By force 
of this Congressional enactment, men are bought and sold, 
women are made the subjects of traffic, and a commerce in 
children is carried on within this territory, under the jurisdic- 
tion of this Government. 

Now, Sir, all that the advocates of freedom ask, is the repeal 
of that law of 1801. Let that be repealed, and the chains will 
instantly fall from every slave in the district. This is the doc- 
trine which, for ten years, we have constantly held forth in this 
hall. We insist that our power to repeal this law of our own 
enacting is clear and indisputable. I have never been able to 
find any member of this body willing to deny this position. 
Yet we sit here and listen to long and eloquent speeches, de- 
nouncing us for attempting to interfere with the rights of slave 
property here. We have heard a most ingenious argument 
from the gentleman who has just taken his seat, (Mr. Cris- 
field,) urging that we have not the constitutional power to 
abolish either slavery or the slave-trade in this district. I had 
hoped that he would have met this position. While listening 
to his speech, I greatly desired to ask him whether he denied 
the power of Congress to repeal its own law to which I have 
referred. He, however, refused to be interrupted. I see the 
gentleman is now in his seat. I feel desirous of knowing 
whether he and I differ on this subject ; and in order to deter- 
mine that question, I respectfully ask him, whether he denies 
the power of Congress to repeal that law of 1801, to which I 
have referred ? And I tender him the floor to answer that 
interrogatory. 

Mr. Crisfield said he had not been paying particular atten- 
tion to what the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Giddings) was 
saying. But he had refused to be interrogated, and should 
refuse answering any questions. 



FEDERAL GOVERNMENT TO SLAVERY. 347 

Mr. Giddings. Yes, Mr. Chairman, that is probably a 
more convenient mode for gentlemen to get along with this 
subject, Evasion, Sir, is their only mode of escape. I call on 
the House and the country to witness, that I desire to meet 
this question openly and candidly. At the very opening of my 
remarks, I tendered the floor to any gentleman who deemed 
me in error, for the purpose of setting me right. I regard it 
as a favor to me, and an act of friendship in any gentleman 
who will propound to me questions for the purpose of eliciting 
truth. That, Sir, is the very object for which I speak. Now, 
if the gentleman admits our power to repeal our own laws, 
then there would be no issue between us in regard to our con- 
stitutional authority. 

The gentleman, and his colleague (Mr. McLane) who spoke 
the other day, insist that we ought not to abolish slavery here, 
until Maryland abolishes it in that State. Slavery, as I have 
already shown, exists by virtue of our own laws. Its exist- 
ence has no more connection with slavery in Maryland, than it 
has with that institution in Algiers. "We, Sir, the people of 
Ohio, — of all the free States, — uphold and sustain slavery in 
this district. Its wrongs, its outrages, its crimes, and its guilt 
rest on us. To God and to mankind we are responsible. Yet 
we are told that we must continue involved in all these enormi- 
ties until the people of Maryland shall awake to the turpitude 
of slavery. The guilt of sustaining the crimes of that institu- 
tion, sits heavy upon the consciences of our people. They are 
deeply anxious to be relieved from it. 

Again, Sir, the slave-trade carried on here, forms a part of 
the institution itself. But the gentleman from Maryland denies 
that the slave-trade exists in this district, or that slave prisons 
are to be found in this city, or that persons are brought here 
from Maryland for sale. Why, Sir, this very day I was applied 
to for counsel in a case where three persons, said to be legally 
entitled to their freedom, were brought from Maryland, and 
during yesterday were sold and taken to Alexandria. At the 
last session, I was called on for counsel in a case where a large 
family was brought from that State and sold South, where, if 



348 RELATION OF THE 

living, they are now dragging out a miserable existence. But 
the gentleman denies that there are slave prisons in this city. 
If he will go to either of these front windows, and cast his eye 
down Maryland avenue as far as Seventh street, he will see a 
large brick building, standing back from both streets, its out- 
buildings surrounded by a high brick wall. Sir, I hesitate not 
to say, that if he will ask any colored person in the city of ten 
years of age, they will tell him " that is a slave pen." I have 
visited it. I went there to redeem my fellow man with " sor- 
did dust," from the grasp of the soul-driver. On my right, 
sits my friend from Pennsylvania, (Mr. Mcllvaine,) who 
accompanied me. I leave it for that gentleman to give a full 
description of the scene which we witnessed on that occasion. 
I have no language adequate to that purpose. The man whom 
we redeemed was there some six or seven clays. He assured 
us that every night during his stay, slaves were brought in 
from the country and confined in that receptacle of suffering 
humanity. 

When gentlemen deny the existence of the slave-trade here, 
do they intend to charge falsehood upon the venerable Justice 
Cranch, and ten hundred and sixty-three other respectable citi- 
zens of this district, who have assured us that this traffic, with 
all its horrors and attendant crimes, is continually carried on in 
this city? There is their petition praying us to deliver them 
from those painful exhibitions of this slave-trade which your 
law has authorized. Yet gentlemen say there is no traffic car- 
ried on here. Will they deny that in April last, Hope H. 
Slatter, a noted dealer in slaves, marched fifty -two men, women, 
and children, victims of this commerce, from the jail in this 
city, through Pennsylvania avenue, to the railroad depot, 
thence to Baltimore, for the southern market, where they now 
pine in bondage ? No man will deny these specific facts. They 
are known to the whole country. 

The gentleman from Indiana (Mr. Thompson) said that he 
had seen nothing of this slave-trade, and sneeringly remarked 
that " gentlemen who had looked for it may have seen it" Sir, 
I receive his taunts with all humility. I am one of those who 



FEDERAL GOVERNMENT TO SLAVERY. 349 

feel it my duty to look around me, and learn the effect of the 
laws which we enact. I have attended the sale of slaves at 
auction in this city for this express purpose. I have witnessed 
the chained coffle as they passed by the very walls of the build- 
ing in which we are now sitting ; where the star-spangled ban- 
ner which floats over us, threw its shadow in bitter irony upon 
those victims of your barbarous law, which we now uphold and 
sustain. 

Now, Sir, I repeat, that this government was not formed for 
the purpose of thus robbing men of their rights, — of degrad- 
ing and brutalizing them. It was not for such purpose that 
our fathers of the revolution toiled and bled. They struggled 
to establish a government that should suppress outrages and 
crimes like these. 

But it is said that this slave-trade causes no suffering ; that 
it produces no distress. There is no doubt that great pains are 
taken to prevent the promulgation of facts which illustrate the 
barbarous character of this traffic. Generally, the slaves of the 
district are sold when they are unconscious of the fact. They 
are sent by their masters to some place agreed upon with the 
purchaser ; there they are seized, gagged, and instantly taken 
to the slave-pen, and few, if any, spectators witness the horrid 
process. Those purchased out of the city, are brought here in 
the night, and are taken away during the hours of darkness. 
This caution has increased as the public attention has been 
turned to the subject, until now but few of its enormities are 
witnessed by the public. 

On a former occasion, I stated that some years since, a man 
of this city, more white than black, having a wife and several 
children, was informed by his owner that she had sold him to 
one of those dealers in our common humanity who hover 
around this city. The man, in a transport of despair, at- 
tempted to cut his throat. He was seized, and the wound was 
dressed; but no sooner was he released from the grasp of 
those who held him, than he ran to the bridge over the canal 
on Seventh street, and threw himself into its turbid waters. 
In death he sought relief from the barbarity inflicted upon him 
30 



350 RELATION OF THE 

by your laws. If the gentleman from Indiana wishes to know 
more of this transaction, I refer him to the then representative 
from the city of Boston, who saw the body taken from its 
watery grave the next morning. Nor is it unusual for the vic- 
tims of this commerce to seek relief in death from those suffer- 
ings to which your laws subject them. 

At a more recent period, I was told of a young woman who 
attempted in the day time to escape from the establishment sit- 
uated on Maryland avenue, to which I have referred. She 
was making her way back to her home in Virginia, and while 
on the bridge over the Potomac, was pursued. Those who 
sought to arrest her gave the alarm to some men who were 
coming from the other side of the river. She halted, looked 
forward, then behind her. She saw that escape was impossi- 
ble. But one appeal was left ; that was to her final Judge. 
She threw herself from the bridge ; the waters closed over her 
body; her spirit ascended to the "Judge of all the earth." 
Believe you, Sir, that He will hold us guiltless of her blood ? 
Is there no responsibility resting on us, who now maintain these 
barbarous laws ? 

A few members are exerting all their efforts to relieve the 
people of the free States from the stain of such infamy, but all 
our labors are baffled by those who show themselves anxious to 
continue these outrages upon humanity. I feel constrained to 
speak frankly on this subject, to point the people to existing 
facts. 

Sir, the Speaker of this House is a distinguished friend of 
the incoming Executive. He was an advocate of General 
Taylor's nomination, many months prior to the occurrence of 
that event. He arranges the committees who hold jurisdiction 
of this slave-trade. A majority of those committees are the 
avowed friends of General Taylor. The petitions of many 
thousands of our northern people, praying to be released from 
the guilt of supporting this infamous traffic, are sent to those 
committees, and are by them buried in silence. "We can extort 
no report upon them. Without such report, the friends of 
humanity can do nothing. There stand the committees, placed 



FEDERAL GOVERNMENT TO SLAV1 

by the Speaker between us and the slave-dealer,-;, upholding 
the law, and encouraging the crimes to which I hn v < ■ ^ 

Mr. Evans, of Maryland, (interrupting Mr. Gi I 
that he understood the gentleman from Ohio to say U I the 
Speaker placed an undue proportion of southern men W 
committees, while the facts were that a majority of 
mittee were from the North. 

Mr. Giddings resumed. I had not charged the S] 
with placing a majority of southern men on those committees. 
I said they were so arranged by the Speaker, that all efforts to 
obtain a report from them upon the petitions referred to their 
consideration, had proved fruitless. They will neither report 
in favor of continuing the sale of slaves in this district, nor will 
they report in favor of abolishing it. 

Mr. Edwards said, they had reported a bill on that subject. 

Mr. Giddings (resuming) remarked, that they had reported 
a bill to prohibit bringing slaves from the surrounding country 
to this market ; but they had left the people of the district 
(those entitled to our protection) to be bought and sold, at the 
option of those who claimed to own them.f After all the 
demonstrations of popular feeling, and after the reiterated 
expression of the sentiments of members in this hall, those 
committees still persist in sustaining the slave merchants while 
they pursue their hated vocation. I would not be uncharita- 
ble ; but it is my duty to let the people understand facts. No 
man has a right to complain when his official acts are placed 
fairly before the public. I will not prejudge General Taylor. 
I wish merely to call public attention to the course which his 
leading friends pursue on this floor. They are generally loud 
in their protestations of devotion to the cause of humanity. 
Yet no man can doubt that had they failed to exert themselves 



* Mr. Winthrop of Massachusetts was then Speaker. 

t This bill passed in 1850, and it was heralded through the pro-slavery 
press with exultation that the slave-trade in the District of Columbia was abol- 
ished. But sales of slaves are now (1853) published in the leading newspapers 
of "Washington city, and sales of human beings are actually made there at pub- 
lic auction. 



$r>- RELATION OF THE 

•onsider the resolution of my friend from New York, 
'Mr. Gott,) this slave-trade would, ere now, have been abol- 
At the time that resolution was adopted, a distin- 
d friend of the incoming Executive, said to be a candi- 
date v c >r the office of Secretary of the Treasury, (Mr. Smith of 
I cticut,) positively fled the hall in apparent dismay. 
' 3r gentleman from Indiana, said to be a candidate for a 

t appointment, (Mr. C. B. Smith,) I believe, failed to 
lough he remained in the hall ; and other lesser lights 
from the North, who are looking for minor offices, voted against 
the resolution. But it was adopted. And we looked upon the 
slave-trade as abolished. 

It is said that the slave-dealers commenced closing up their 
business, and the slave mother, pressing her child more closely 
to her bosom, breathed her silent gratitude to God for the pros- 
pect that she would soon cease to tremble at the thought that 
the soul-driver would tear from her the object of her tenderest 
affections. But, gentlemen, leading friends of the incoming 
administration, appeared anxious to reconsider the vote adopt- 
ing the resolution. The gentleman from Indiana (Mr. C. B. 
Smith) said he was desirous to reconsider it, as he wanted 
"some practical legislation." What could have been more 
practical than its entire and instantaneous abolition, I have yet 
to learn. But both the gentlemen to whom I have just re- 
ferred, and other northern members, said to be candidates for 
executive appointments, voted to reconsider the resolution ; and 
their efforts prevailed. The resolution was reconsidered, and 
now stands on your calendar, never again to be taken up. 

The slave-trade is revived ; the dealers in humanity have 
made new investments ; more men have been purchased, more 
women have been collected, and an increased number of chil- 
dren obtained for the southern market ; and here ends the gen- 
tleman's "practical legislation." Sir, I am sick at heart, my 
soul is nauseated with these deceptions, evasions, and never- 
ending tergiversations. I tried to draw from the gentleman 
from Indiana (Mr. Caleb B. Smith) an express avowal of his 
own wishes. I respectfully asked him, in the presence of the 



\ 



FEDERAL GOVERNMENT TO SLAVERY. 

House, whether he desired to continue slavery in this di 
But I could not learn. He answered that his opinions n 
well knoivn. Now, Sir, they may have been known to 1 
and to his more intimate friends ; but I did not knov 
could not learn. He refused to inform me ; but he snee 
said, that " when he submitted the question to the people of tin 
district, he ivould not allow negroes to vote." 

I believe that gentleman was born and educated in a 
where negroes vote, where the equality of all men is re< 
nized. He may now revile the sublime truths, the mainte- 
nance of which constitutes the true glory of that " old Bay 
State " which gave him birth ; he may despise the doctrines 
which gave unfading lustre to the names of Hancock and of 
Adams ; he may pander for the slave-holders ; but time will 
demonstrate to him that the people do not regard that course as 
the evidence of patriotism. 

Thus, Sir, are slavery and the slave-trade in this district 
upheld and protected by leading friends of General Taylor. 
In calling attention to these facts, I shall do no injustice to any 
man or any party. We shall soon see farther developments. 
Will General Taylor, with these facts before him and known 
to the country, select his officers from among those who now 
exert their official influence to protect this slave-trade, to sus- 
tain crimes which strike us with horror ? If he does, such indi- 
cations will be regarded as establishing the character of his 
administration. Those members who believe that the powers 
of this government ought to be exerted to rob men of their 
inalienable rights, will sustain him ; and he will be opposed by 
those who think such powers should be exerted to secure those 
rights and to elevate our race.* 

I am fully aware that a great effort is making to divert pub- 
lic attention from this issue, and to revive old party divisions. 
But I am of opinion that the experience of the present session 

* Mr. Smith and eleven other members who voted to reconsider the resolu- 
tion to abolish the slave-trade in the District of Columbia, were appointed to 
high and profitable offices; but it is believed that not a member who voted 
against such reconsideration received anv favor from the Executive. 
30* 



354 RELATION OF THE 

.illy demonstrated the perfect hopelessness of that attempt. 
>rtion of both the old parties will, under all circumstances, 

stain the doctrine that we are bound to support this system 
>f southern oppression ; while a large portion of both parties 
*dll oppose it with all the power and influence which they pos- 

•ss. 

I need say nothing of the importance of this transcendent 
, nation. It is the same issue which led our fathers to the 

ittle-fields of the Revolution. They intended to separate our 
country from the advocates of oppression ; from the influence 
of those who used civil power to deprive men of their just 
rights. But the spirit of oppression had taken deep root upon 
this American soil. It was suffered to remain ; and, at the 
formation of the Constitution, it retained possession of the slave 
States as the only field of its operations. It is ever aggressive. 
It now demands aid of this government to extend its sphere, 
and to maintain its ascendancy in this district and upon the 
high seas. The freemen of the North are now called upon to 
participate in its crimes and share its disgrace. Shall we com- 
ply ? That is the question. Shall we assist in subverting the 
fundamental doctrines of our government ? Are the principles 
of freedom which we have so long cherished now to be basely 
surrendered ? 

The manifestations of popular sentiment exhibited at Buf- 
falo in August last, seconded by three hundred thousand free 
electors in November, and responded to by the legislature of 
nearly every free State, sustained by a hundred presses, now 
give an emphatic answer. 

Tell me not of the whig party, or of the democratic party, 
while their hands are dripping with the blood of innocent vic- 
tims daily hurried to their final account by the barbarity of 
those laws which they support. Whether those crimes be pro- 
tected by whig or by democratic votes,- 1 will not participate in 
the turpitude. 

The time has arrived when parties must separate on this 
absorbing question. Those who support outrage and crime will 
be politically opposed by those who adhere to the " self-evident 



FEDERAL GOVERNMENT TO SLAVERY. 

truth " of man's equality. On those truths we bade o- 
Those who are not with us are against us. Th^ 
neutrals. Every man is in favor of this slave-tra, 
attendant crimes, or he is against it. Those with who; 
are opposed to every man and every party who upholds 
sion. 

We shall put forth our utmost endeavors to strike the 
of bondage from the limbs of mankind, wherever this i 
ment has power to legislate. "Free soil, free men, and free 
speech," is our motto. If General Taylor and his friends 
unite with us, we shall rejoice to act with them. They may 
have the offices ; we want them not. "We desire to extend lib- 
erty to the down-trodden, to raise up the bowed-down, to exalt 
our race. To this object our energies will be directed. And 
if General Taylor's administration shall be devoted to riveting 
the chains of servitude upon our fellow man, to the degradation 
of any portion of our race, then, Sir, we shall be opposed to 
him. I make these remarks that our position may be distinctly 
understood. 

There is one point on which some gentlemen appear to 
deceive themselves. They urge the passage of a bill to organ- 
ize our Mexican territory, in order to silence the agitation in 
regard to slavery. They should be undeceived. They should 
distinctly understand that, while the people of the free States 
are involved in the support of slavery in this district, or of the 
coastwise slave-trade ; while Congress lends its powers and 
influence to rob a portion of the people of their inalienable 
rights, northern philanthropy and northern patriotism will 
make their voices heard in this hall. Nor will they be silenced 
until this district is rendered free, until the nation's flag shall 
cease to float over cargoes of slaves, and the territories of the 
United States shall be exempt from the curse of oppression. 
"VVe wish to deceive no one. We desire all to understand our 
position. We base our efforts distinctly upon the letter and 
the spirit of the Constitution. Separation of the Federal Gov- 
ernment and the people of the free States from all participa- 
tion in the support of slavery, constitutes our object. Nor shall 



RELATION OF THE 

?lax ova* exertions while a slave shall be held as such 

the laws of Congress. 
Q c myself and political friends are charged with " agitation." 

is intended by this language I do not precisely under- 

No man accuses us of bringing irrelevant or improper 

its into discussion, or that we speak upon them at improper 

.es j nor do they charge us with misrepresentation or erro- 

statements. If they intend by this language to say that 

•ak truth without disguise, that we do not attempt to 
suppress facts, then, Sir, I admit the correctness of their asser- 
tion. They do not deny our doctrines. No man, either North 
or South, will rise here and take issue on any principle 
embraced in our political creed. I repeat, that I am wholly 
incapable of understanding the import of this charge of agita- 
tion made against the free soil members of this House. 

Gentlemen have constantly asserted that northern members 
were invading the rights of the South. The gentleman from 
Indiana, (Mr. Thompson,) and the gentleman from Pennsyl- 
vania, (Mr. Brown,) and my colleague, (Mr. Taylor,) were all 
understood as imputing to us efforts to interfere with southern 
rights. For years I have listened to such charges. They 
seem to be stereotyped. For years I have called on gentle- 
men to come down from these general denunciations, and spe- 
cify an instance in which any proposition was ever made in 
this body to invade the rights of the South. I have constantly 
called on them to state who made such proposition ; to give us 
the name. When was such proposition made ? What was the 
proposition ? To all these questions a respectful silence is the 
only answer which I have ever been able to obtain. 

But gentlemen find fault with northern democrats for voting 
with us. One gentleman charged them with having changed 
their course of action on the subject of slavery. And who has 
not changed on this subject ? I well recollect that my late 
venerable and lamented friend (Mr. Adams) interested me 
greatly when describing this change in his own mind. We 
have all changed. But it is said that the democrats are not 
sincere in their professions. Of that I can only judge by their 



FEDERAL GOVERNMENT TO SLAVERY. 357 

acts. The voice of inspiration has taught us to show our 
faith by our works. If men will speak, and act, and vote 
right, I will leave the examination of their hearts to "Him 
who searcheth the heart." But those gentlemen who make 
this complaint will neither speak, nor act, nor vote in favor of 
freedom ; yet they complain of the motives of others. " ! 
consistency, thou art a jewel." I am constrained to regard 
these gentlemen as sincere, when voting against freedom, pre- 
cisely as I feel bound to believe those sincere who vote against 
slavery. 

During the discussions of this body, those with whom I act 
have been reproached for having supported for President a 
man who, in former times, was opposed to the abolition of sla- 
very in this district. Sir, the charge is true. Mr. Van Buren, 
in 1837, like all our public men of both parties at that time, 
was undoubtedly opposed to the abolition of slavery in this dis- 
trict. The subject had undergone no investigation by them. 
They had not looked into it. Even John Quincy Adams, the 
distinguished friend of humanity, was then opposed to that 
measure. The gentlemen who now assail us not only sup- 
ported the same doctrines at that time, but they now sustain 
both slavery and the slave-trade in this city, and assail all who 
attempt to abolish them. The difference between these gentle- 
men and Mr. Van Buren is this : he now avows our doctrines ; 
they adhere to the slave-trade, with all its turpitude ; and they 
supported a man for President who made no professions on the 
subject, but who is a slave-holder, and whose interest and 
associations are all in favor of that institution. 

It is also true that Mr. Van Buren, while President, followed 
the example of General Jackson, in lending the influence of 
his office to sustain the coastwise slave-trade. In this he com- 
plied with the avowed opinion of the Senate. That august 
body adopted resolutions, as late as 1840, unanimously declar- 
ing it to be the duty of this government to protect those who 
were engaged in that detestable traffic. Neither whig nor 
democrat then denied the correctness of that doctrine. No 
man who now denounces Mr. Van Buren, then even objected 



358 RELATION OR THE 

to his policy. Indeed, when I alone, and single-handed, denied 
its correctness, not one of them stood by me or sustained me 
in that denial. But the Convention at Buffalo which nomi- 
nated Mr. Van Buren, declared it the duty of this government, 
" to relieve itself from all support of slavery and the slave- 
trade." In answer to this doctrine, Mr. Yan Buren replied, 
that " it breathes the right spirit ; " and he pledged himself to 
its support. Before Heaven I believe the doctrine to be right. 
I had no doubt of his sincerity, and I advocated his election 
cheerfully and cordially. Sir, I would rather have been the 
author of that letter than to enjoy all the honors that he has 
ever gained in discharging the duties of President. 

Several gentlemen have inquired, rather vaunt ingly, what 
we have effected by our labors in the cause of humanity ? 
They will find a very satisfactory answer to this interrogatory 
in the address of the southern members to which I have called 
attention. 

When I first took my seat in this hall, the petitions of our 
people asking to be relieved from the burden, the guilt, and 
disgrace of supporting the slave-trade, were not received, nor 
were they permitted to be read ; but they were treated with 
the most marked contempt. I found here that distinguished 
statesman whom history will describe as the great champion of 
popular rights, (Mr. J. Q. Adams ;) he was laboring to regain 
the right of petition. His zeal and devotion to that cause were 
unbounded. His spirit was undaunted, and his energy never 
relaxed. Who that was then here has forgotten his herculean 
labors ? No difficulties embarrassed, no dangers deterred him. 
His determination of purpose appeared to be more and more 
developed as opposition increased. We saw him arraigned at 
your bar, like a base felon, for no other charge than that of 
sustaining the right of the people ; and as the dark storm of 
human passions gathered thick, and the tempest raged, and the 
waves of vituperation and calumny rolled and dashed in wild 
confusion around him, he stood calm and unmoved in his pur- 
pose as the adamantine rock. Who has forgotten the bound- 
less resources of his intellect, or his unrivalled eloquence, or 



FEDERAL GOVERNMENT TO SLAVERY. 359 

his terrible invective ? They were all called forth and exerted 
in favor of the right of petition. I rejoice that he lived to 
witness the consummation of his labors. He has now gone to 
his rest, but the affections of a nation cluster around his 
memory. - 

At my first entrance to this hall, no member was allowed to 
speak irreverently of the slave-trade, or of slavery. A more 
unrelenting tyranny never existed in a Turkish divan, than 
reigned here. The gentleman who now fills the Presidentiaf 
chair then presided over our deliberations, and most effectually 
did he exercise his authority for the suppression of truth and of 
liberty. For years my lips were hermetically sealed on the 
subject of humanity. Often have I listened for hours to 
language insulting to myself, to my constituents, and to the 
people of the free States, without the liberty of saying a word 
in vindication of those whom I represented, or of expressing 
in any degree the indignant emotions which prompted the utter- 
ance of salutary truth. Often have I seen the venerable and 
world-honored member from Massachusetts (Mr. J. Q. Adams) 
peremptorily ordered to his seat when he dared even to allude 
to the slave-trade, or to the slavery which was sustained in this 
district by laws of our own enactment. But how changed the 
scene ! I can scarcely realize that this is the hall in which I 
have witnessed the display of deadly weapons, exhibited for 
the purpose of intimidating northern members to keep silence 
in regard to the crimes and disgrace of slavery. Here, Sir, in 
this body has been displayed, in the most striking manner, the 
power of truth. The freedom of speech has been regained. 

We now give free utterance to the emotions of the soul in 
behalf of suffering humanity. We have regained and now 
enjoy an equality of privileges with southern members. This 
important reformation has been brought about by toil, and 
labor, and suffering which never will and never can be appre- 
ciated by any person who has not shared in them. It is, how- 
ever, due to truth that I should say, northern servility, mani- 
fested through a venal press, and exhibited to this body in 
speeches, in a variety of ways, has presented even greater 



360 RELATION OF THE 

obstacles to the progress of truth than all the opposition of 
southern men. 

Another evidence of the progress of the great reformation 
now going on is to be found in the action of the Executive. 
In 1832, a slave-ship, (the Comet,) laden with slaves, sailed 
from this district for New Orleans, and was wrecked on one of 
the British West India Islands. When the slaves reached 
British soil they became instantly free, and each went in pur- 
suit of his own fortune. The slave-dealers demanded that the 
British authorities should arrest and return them to their own- 
ers, but they spurned the degrading proposition. The slave 
merchants, thus failing in their speculations, returned to this 
city, and demanded that the character and influence of the 
nation should be prostituted to aid them in obtaining a compen- 
sation for their loss from the government of England. And 
strange to say, the President, instead of recommending to Con- 
gress the passage of laws to punish with death the crimes of 
which they had been guilty, sent orders to our minister at the 
Court of St. James to demand, in the name of this govern- 
ment, indemnity for the loss of those slaves. The orders of 
the President were obeyed. 

Our minister, (Mr. Stevenson,) however, still further dis- 
graced the government. In order to obtain pecuniary indem- 
nity for crimes of the deepest dye, he had recourse to misrep- 
resentation — to flagrant falsehood. I invite the friends of that 
gentleman to call me to an account for what I am saying ; to 
demand explanation before this body and the country, for the 
charge I make against him. He, however, deceived the 
British ministers, and obtained the money. The people of 
Great Britain have paid these slave merchants for the commis- 
sion of crimes more aggravated than that of murder or of 
piracy. Other slave-ships were wrecked, and their cargoes 
obtained freedom in the same manner, and compensation was 
demanded, and in once instance obtained ; in others it was 
refused. The South became clamorous. The Senate passed 
resolutions unanimously declaring that it was the duty of this 
government to support this coastwise slave-trade. A report 



FEDERAL GOVERNMENT TO SLAVERY. 361 

from the Committee on Foreign Relations in this body was 
made, hinting at war in case indemnity was withheld from 
these slave-dealers ; and speeches were made, even by north- 
ern members, which indicated a willingness to see our country 
involved in a war to support this infamous traffic. 

The case of the Creole is fresh in the recollections of all 
who hear me. On board that ship the slaves, conscious of the 
rights with which God had endowed them, and true to the 
noblest impulses of our nature, asserted and maintained in 
practice the doctrines of our revolutionary fathers. They 
regained their freedom by their own physical strength. They 
then navigated the ship to the island of New Providence, and 
each sought his own happiness. At that time a whig adminis- 
tration controlled the government. Mr. Van Buren, now so 
much denounced for his favor to the slave power, had retired 
to Lindenwold. The Executive sent immediate orders to our 
minister at London to demand compensation of the English 
government for the loss of these slave merchants who had 
been unable to control their human cargo. 

Sir, I then saw the party with whom I had always acted 
about to commit itself and the government to the support of a 
detestable commerce in mankind. I saw the Constitution 
violated, by a prostitution of our national influence to support 
a traffic detested by men, and cursed of Heaven ; a traffic abhor- 
rent to every feeling of our nature, and at war with every princi- 
ple of Christianity. I had sworn at your altar faithfully to sup- 
port that Constitution. I saw no way but to express my views, 
humble and unpretending as they were. I did so in a series 
of resolutions, denying the right of this government thus to 
involve the people of the free States in the expense, disgrace, 
and crimes of the slave-trade. The effect of that movement 
upon myself was unimportant — of that I do not speak; but 
the effect which it exerted upon the government should be 
known and understood by all. It called public attention to the 
subject. The press of the North spoke forth the sentiments of 
the North. Leading men and statesmen denounced the 
practice of involving the people of the free States in the 
31 



362 RELATION OF THE 

support of crimes at the contemplation of which humanity 
shudders. 

In view of these demonstrations, a slave-holding Executive 
hesitated in his course, doubted, and ceased to follow a practice 
which for years had disgraced the nation. I speak from contem- 
poraneous history. I refer to the first volume of " "Wheeler's 
Political and Biographical History," a work compiled with 
great labor and ability, and which may be consulted even by 
statesmen with profit. The author, speaking of the effect of 
that movement, says that he " has been unable to learn that 
the demand of this government for the loss of slaves was ever 
renewed." I have other evidence, satisfactory to myself, that 
the demand was never pressed afterwards. 

Thus, Sir, the Executive has been driven from a position at 
war with our national honor, with justice, with humanity, and 
with the Constitution. 

When asked what we had effected by our efforts, I answer, 
that in Congress we have regained the right of petition and 
the freedom of debate. "We have relieved the government 
from the ostensible support of the coastwise slave-trade. We 
have called the attention of statesmen and jurists to the inves- 
tigation of those rights which northern freemen hold under the 
federal compact. We have rendered northern servility un- 
popular. Where now are those timid, faltering statesmen of 
the North who filled these seats ten years since ? During the 
short period of my service in this body, I have seen whole 
generations, as it were, appear here, avow their detestation of 
those who maintained the rights of our people and of human- 
ity, meekly bow to the dictates of the slave power, and then 
depart to that political "bourn from which no traveller returns." 
Where are now those northern members who, only seven years 
since, voted to censure me for merely asserting the rights of 
my constituents to be exempt from the crimes attendant upon 
the coastwise slave-trade ? Why, Sir, three or four of them 
yet remain, the " spared monuments " of the people's mercy ; 
but I believe not one of them has been reelected to meet me 
here in December next. A few days will separate us probably 



FFJDTCRAT, GOVJEKJMMENT TO SLAiEKI. 363 

forever. Towards them T feel no unkindness; and T now refer 
to the faet as showing the progress of that revolution which is 
going forward. 

Look at the other end of the capitol, and you will find un- 
mistakable evidences of the change now going on in the popu- 
lar mind. Read the proceedings of our State Legislatures. 
In Ohio, at one vote, they have erased from our statutes the 
whole code of black laws which have disgraced the State for 
nearly half a century. In Pennsylvania, they have gone even 
farther in the cause of justice and freedom ; they have very 
properly rendered it penal for the citizens or officers of that 
State to aid or assist the slave-catcher in seizing upon the 
victims of his unrighteous oppression, as they fly from bond- 
age. New York, too, that " Empire State," is assuming a 
position on this subject worthy of herself. 

Of other States I need not speak. The effects of our labors 
are seen and felt in every free State — in every county, town, 
and school district of the free States. They are visible in our 
social circles, in our pulpits, in our literary publications, our 
newspapers, our debating clubs, our political discussions, and in 
all departments of society. The foundations of the mighty 
deep of popular sentiment are broken up. Political parties 
are disorganized, and party attachments are disregarded. 

These are some of the effects of that moral and political 
revolution now going forward in this nation. I trust it will 
continue to progress, until this government and the people 
of the free States shall be fully redeemed and purified from 
the contagion of slavery and all manner of oppression, and the 
Constitution and the rights of humanity shall be fully vindi- 
cated. 



SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE OF REPRESENT- 
ATIVES.* 



HIS POWERS — DICTATES THE BUSINESS OF THAT BODY — THE MANNER OF 
HIS ELECTION IN EIGHTEEN HUNDRED AND FORT Y-NINE — THE FORMER 
SPEAKER — HIS CHANGE OF POSITION — HIS SUPPORT OF THE MEXICAN 
WAR — OF SLAVERY IN THE TERRITORIES — OF THE SLAVE-TRADE IN THE 
DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA — REJECTED BY THE ADVOCATES OF LIBERTY — 
THE WHIG PARTY — THELR CHANGE LN RELATION TO THE SLAVE-TRADE 
— THOSE WHO THUS CHANGED, SUBSEQUENTLY APPOINTED TO OFFICE — 
COURSE OF THE FREE DEMOCRACY VINDICATED. 

[At the assembling of Congress in 1849, the free democracy held the balance 
of power. Neither whigs nor democrats could elect a Speaker without their 
aid. The contest was continued for three weeks, with unusual excitement. 
The free democrats stood firm ; they proclaimed their determination to vote 
for no candidate who would not pledge himself to use his influence for freedom 
in the territories, and against the slave-trade in the District of Columbia. The 
whigs endeavored to make the country believe their candidate was in favor of 
that policy. He had presided over the former Congress, and had so arranged 
the committees as to maintain the slave-trade in the District of Columbia, and 
to prevent any report in favor of excluding slavery from the territories, until 
ordered so to do by the House. With these facts before them, the free demo- 
cracy would not support him. The whigs, however, with the aid of a portion 
of the democrats, adopted a resolution giving the election to the candidate 
having the highest number of votes, instead of electing him by a majority of 
the votes given. Mr. Cobb of Georgia, a slave-holder, was elected ; and the free 
soilers were assailed by the northern whig press, and charged with electing 
Mr. Cobb, instead of Mr. Winthrop, who they alleged was in favor of exclud- 
ing slavery from our territories, and opposed to the slave-trade. To vindicate 
himself and friends against these charges, Mr. Giddings made the following 
speech.] 

Mr. Speaker, — The appointment of all committees of this 
body, is confided to its presiding officer. He assigns to each 

* Speech on the Rules of the House. Delivered December 27, 1849. 



SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE. 365 

committee, such members as will speak his views, and carry 
out his policy, which may generally be regarded as the views 
and the policy of the party electing him. His powers for the 
time being, are, perhaps, greater than those of any other offi- 
cer of the government. He holds a position in which he 
wields far more influence upon the legislation of Congress, 
than the President of the United States. 

The recent contest for that office, has been one of great 
interest here and throughout the country. A slave-holder has 
been elected, and it has been w r ith no small degree of astonish- 
ment, that I have seen through most of the northern whig 
papers the announcement, that I and my political friends have 
effected his elevation by our votes. 

Sir, I desire to say to this body and to the country, that the 
present speaker holds his office as the legitimate effect of the 
plurality rule, for which nearly every w T hig voted ; and they 
must have done so with the full knowledge that such would be 
the result. They doubtless intended, by the adoption of that 
rule, to drive the advocates of liberty back to their former 
party attachments. This they had no right to expect. The 
free democracy is not made of such pliant materials ; but had 
they separated, and each gone to his former party, the present 
speaker would have been elected by a majority of four votes. 
One hundred and sixteen members had been elected by the 
democrats, or by aid of democratic votes, and one hundred and 
fourteen only by whigs, or by aid of whig votes, and two of 
them were absent. With these facts before us, no one can 
doubt the effect of the plurality vote, adopted almost exclu- 
sively by whig votes. 

Mr. "White. "Was there any other way to organize the 
House ? 

Mr. Giddings. There was. If the question of freedom in 
the territories had been regarded by the whigs as an object, 
they might at any time have elected a democrat favorable to 
that policy. They could have elected the gentleman over the 
way, (Mr. Strong,) who is said also to be in favor of river 
31* 



366 SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE. 

and harbor improvements, and a protective tariff, or they 
might have elected my friend from New York, (Mr. Preston 
King,) or my friend from Pennsylvania, (Mr. Wilmot,) or my 
colleague from the Huron district, (Mr. Root). Had the whigs 
voted for any one of those gentlemen, they could have elected 
him at any ballot. Free soilers had intended to be liberal 
and just. They had voted for my whig friend from Pennsyl- 
vania, (Mr. Thaddeus Stevens,) a man recommended as a 
whig, but one who had no hesitation in avowing his attachment 
to freedom. Had the whig party voted for him, he might have 
been elected at any time. In short, Sir, had the whigs united 
on any man who was unconditionally committed to the cause of 
free soil and of humanity, even if a whig, he would have been 
elected. They were informed of these facts by free soilers, 
at different times during the ballotings ; but they adhered per- 
tinaciously to their caucus nominee. They appeared deter- 
mined to stand or fall with him. They would go for no other 
candidate. Indeed, it appeared to me that they intended to 
elect him, or a slave-holding democrat. 

All were conscious that the free soil vote would be given for 
any candidate of either party who stood publicly pledged to 
the Wilmot proviso, so soon as their vote would effect his elec- 
tion. I could, therefore, see no other object in a proposition to 
unite whigs and democrats on some new plan for electing a 
Speaker, than to avoid the election of a man committed to 
freedom in the territories. This conviction was so strongly 
impressed on my own mind, that I called the attention of the 
House to it on the morning of the 20th instant, as plainly as I 
could under the gag resolution then in force, by the interroga- 
tories propounded to a gentleman from Massachusetts, (Mr. 
Ashmun). 

But the vote of a plurality of this body would, under the 
Constitution, confer no right whatever to the office of Speaker. 
This was well understood' by the House. The vote merely 
operated as a nomination, while the election was made by 
adopting the resolution of the gentleman from North Carolina, 
(Mr. Stanley). That resolution reads as follows : 



SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE. 367 

" Resolved, That the Hon. Howell Cobb, a Kepresentative from the State of 
Georgia be, and he is hereby declared duly elected Speaker of this House for 
the thirty-first Congi'ess." 

This resolution gave him the office, constituted him Speaker. 
"Without it, he would have had no claim to the Speakership. 
This was adopted, and the Speaker elected by the united vote 
of nearly the entire whig and democratic parties, and was 
clearly a part of the original agreement by which the plurality 
rule was adopted. The whig press now turn round and charge 
free soilers with electing the present Speaker. 

Mr. Schenck inquired if Mr. Giddings had not an oppor- 
tunity of choosing between the present Speaker and a whig 
committed to the proviso ? 

Mr. Giddings. Certainly ; I did so when I voted for the 
gentleman from Pennsylvania, (Mr. Stevens). 

Mr. Schenck inquired if his colleague did not have the 
opportunity of choosing between the whig nominee and the 
gentleman elected ? 

Mr. Giddings. I regret that my colleague has pressed that 
question upon me. I had not intended to make any personal 
allusions to the honorable gentleman who filled the Speaker's 
chair during the last Congress, (Mr. Winthrop). It is known 
to the House and to the country, that on the assembling of the 
last Congress, two honorable gentleman, who had acted with 
the whig party, together with myself, refused to vote for the 
gentleman at that time nominated by the whigs. A learned 
and honorable gentleman from Massachusetts, (Mr. Palfrey,) 
with my entire approbation, propounded to the candidate inter- 
rogatories as to the manner in which he would, if elected, con- 
stitute certain committees to whom petitions in regard to the 
slave-trade and slavery in this district, are, by the rules of the 
House, committed. The gentleman refused to inform us ; but 
referred to his past acts and votes, from which we were to 
judge of his future course. These were not satisfactory, how- 
ever, and we refused to vote for him. My colleague now 
inquires, if I did not know that that same gentleman was in. 
favor of the proviso? I answer, I do not know any such 



368 SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE. 

tiling, — how could I know it ? He refused to declare his sen- 
timents. Why did he withhold them from the public ? Every 
man is aware that he did so in order to obtain votes from mem- 
bers who would not sustain him if his opinions were known. 
While I felt no disposition to defraud others, I had no desire to 
be made a dupe myself. I therefore could not vote for him. 
His public acts do not show him in favor of the proviso. The 
Committee on Territories selected by him, refused to report a 
bill excluding slavery from California until peremptorily or- 
dered by the House. 

Mr. Rockwell asked if the gentleman intended to say that 
the Committee on Territories refused to report such a bill ? 

Mr. Giddings. I will say they neglected to report such a 
bill. Probably that term is more appropriate than to say they 
refused to report it. 

The Committee on the District of Columbia, during the late 
Congress, appeared to have been arranged in such manner as 
studiously to protect that infamous commerce in human flesh 
now carried on in this city. That committee had before them 
thousands of petitions from the North, praying the abolition of 
the slave-trade carried on here. They had witnessed the 
heart-rending scenes which transpired on our principal avenue 
in May, 1848, when that slave-dealer, Hope H. Slatter, with 
his mournful procession of fifty-two fathers and mothers and 
children marched through that court street of our city, on their 
way to graves in the far South. I cannot say that the then 
Speaker, and the committees which he had arranged, were per- 
sonally present and witnessed that worse than barbarian spec- 
tacle. But if they were not eye witnesses of that revolting 
scene, they knew all the facts, and understood its true charac- 
ter. Yet not all these considerations, aided by the voice of 
northern philanthropy, enforced by thousands of petitions, 
could extort from these committees a report against the slave- 
trade, or even a reproof of that traffic. 

But it may be urged that the Speaker was ignorant of the 
views of the gentlemen whom he had placed on these commit- 
tees. Did he mistake the character of those whom he placed 



SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE. 369 

on committees which exerted a political influence ? Not at all. 
The character of every anti-slavery man in this body was as 
well known, as was that of whigs or of democrats. But surely 
no excuse of this kind could possibly apply to him at the 
second session, when he again arranged those committees. He 
then certainly knew the character of every member. Their 
sentiments were on record, and he could not have mistaken the 
views of any one. Nearly all of the same members were a 
second time placed on these committees ; and the slave-trade 
was again upheld and protected by them. The petitions of the 
whole North were again suppressed ; and there those commit- 
tees stood between us and those who deal in human flesh, — 
who commit crimes at which humanity shudders. Those crimes 
were protected ; and those who perpetrated them were encour- 
aged by committees placed there by a Speaker elected by a 
party with whom I had once felt proud to act. 

Now, Sir, the same gentleman was at this session again pre- 
sented as a candidate, and free soilers were asked to vote for 
him, — to sanction the arrangement of those committees, and 
to approve the slave-trade, with its Heaven-daring iniquities. 
"We were called on to choose between him and the gentleman 
who now occupies the chair. God forbid that I should choose 
between them ! I speak with proper respect for both those 
gentlemen ; they look upon these things in a different light. I 
speak of the character in which the slave-trade presents itself 
to my view. I do not believe that a member on this floor, or a 
person in the whole country, has for a moment believed that I 
could be made to vote for either of those gentlemen, — that I 
could be constrained by any circumstance to lend the sanction 
of my vote to any one who exerts his official influence to main- 
tain this execrable commerce in human flesh. Yet one thing 
is certain, the present Speaker can do no worse than the last ; 
he may do better. 

I regret, Sir, that my colleague felt it his duty to press me 
into this explanation, which I was desirous of avoiding. I now 
speak to the country. The people of my district understand 
this matter. These things were all pressed against me pending 



370 SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE. 

my last election. An appeal was then made to my constituent,-. 
I was charged with refusing my support to the gentleman from 
Massachusetts. I left the district early in the canvass, and did 
not return until after the election. The hunker whigs and 
hunker democrats united for the purpose of defeating me. But 
my constituents approved my course ; they sent me back by a 
majority of some thousands, with the expectation that I would 
maintain my position. To them and to the country I stood 
pledged to vote for no man to the office of Speaker who lends 
his influence to support the slave-trade. 

[Mr. Winthrop, Mr. Eockwell, and Mr. Schenck followed 
Mr. Giddings, in opposition to the views he had expressed.] 

Mr. Giddings having again obtained the floor, said that no 
gentleman regretted the present discussion more than himself; 
and the House would bear him witness that he had been forced 
into it. I came here, said he, intending to discharge my duties 
in a quiet, unpretending manner ; but when I saw myself 
assailed through the leading Taylor papers of the North, I felt 
it a duty to say a few words in vindication of my own course. 
On this floor I have been assailed, because I dared to vote for 
such man to the office of Speaker as my judgment and my 
conscience dictated. In short, it has come to this, that gentle- 
men in this hall undertake to say who I shall vote for, and who 
I shall vote against. 

Now, I was sent here to act according to the dictates of my 
own judgment. I came here with no expectation or intention 
to look to any man, or to any number of men, for instruction 
as to the candidate for whom I should cast my vote. While I 
was previously on the floor, I stated some of the reasons why I 
refused to vote for the gentleman from Massachusetts, (Mr. 
Winthrop) . This was done in the most general terms possible, 
in order to avoid a conflict with that gentleman. But he, in 
reply, has seen fit to refer back to the commencement of the 
last Congress, and to allude to further objections which I made 
to him as a candidate for Speaker at that time. The gentle- 
man having referred to my published vindication, with some 
warmth of feeling pronounced a statement which I then made 



SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE. 371 

to be false. The language is rather unusual for this hall. It 
was used under very evident excitement. But it is my duty to 
reply to it dispassionately. Sir, during the Presidential cam- 
paign of 1844, the whole whig party denounced and execrated 
the Mexican war. None did this with more zeal or more sin- 
cerity than myself. The gentleman from Massachusetts also 
denounced it. I supposed him and other whigs to be sincere 
and honest in their denunciations ; but when the question came 
before us in 1846, that gentleman changed his position and 
voted for the war. 

Mr. Winthrop. Does the gentleman say that I voted for 
the war ? 

Mr. Giddings. I intend to say that the gentleman did vote 
for the war, — for the bill declaring war. It was this change 
of position on that momentous question which constituted one 
of my objections to him as Speaker in 1847. 

Mr. Winthrop. I deny that I ever changed my position. 

Mr. Giddings. This constituted but one of my objections. 
At that time, as at the recent election, I felt bound to obey the 
dictates of my own judgment, and voted for another gentleman. 
For thus daring to think for myself, for not permitting a whig 
caucus to think for me, to dictate my course of action, I was 
denounced by the Taylor papers of that day as an apostate 
from the whig party. The papers most warmly in support of 
the gentleman from Massachusetts were loudest in their attacks 
on me. I thought proper to publish a vindication of my vote. 
In it I stated distinctly the change of that gentleman's position 
in regard to the war, as one of the objections which I had to 
his election. It was this tergiversation to which I stood op- 
posed. 

In writing out my vindication, I stated the fact that he had 
voted for the war, and in a whig caucus had proposed that the 
party should vote for it. The fact that he thus voted is placed 
upon the Journal of the House. No effort can change, no time 
can erase it. There it stands, and there it will remain forever, 
conclusive and indubitable proof of the gentleman's change of 
position. It was the most solemn evidence that he approved 



372 SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE. 

the war. In his subsequent administration, he arranged the 
committees so as to continue the war ; so as to recommend 
appropriations to carry forward the work of devastation and 
bloodshed, instead of withdrawing the army and doing justice 
to Mexico. Neither he nor his friends ever have, or ever will 
deny these solemn truths which appear on record. But, admit- 
ting all these, he attempts to evade their force by saying that, 
although he voted for the war, he did not recommend in caucus 
that others should vote for it. He thus attempts to leave the 
substance, for the purpose of contending about the shadow. If 
it were right for him to vote for the war, it could not have 
been wrong for him to advise others to do so ; yet this collat- 
eral fact is not a matter of record. I stated it from positive 
knowledge, from what I knew. He denies it, and says it is 
false. He may, and undoubtedly has forgotten it. The Hon- 
orable E. D. Culver, in a letter published at the time, relates 
all the facts to which I alluded in my vindication. Yet he does 
not hesitate at this time to pronounce the statements of myself 
and of Mr. Culver hoik false. 

But this point on which he attempts to make up an issue, is 
merely collateral to the important fact that he changed his 
position in relation to the war. I repeat, that fact is indisputa- 
ble ; it is on record. To that record the country will hold the 
gentleman. He cannot escape through an immaterial issue. 
No chicanery of special pleading can relieve him from the 
charge of voting for the war, and of sustaining it, after he and 
his party had denounced and execrated it. But, Sir, I had no 
intention of referring to this matter. The gentleman has 
dragged me into this part of the debate, and I am constrained 
to meet him. It gives me no pleasure thus to refer to his past 
political course. My objections rested in my own breast, and 
would never have appeared before the public, but for the 
attacks made upon me by him and his friends. 

The gentlemen says that the member from Tennessee (Mr. 
Johnson) has assailed him because he was opposed to the inter- 
ests of slavery, and that he will leave that gentleman's speech 
and mine to answer each other. Unfortunately for the gentle- 



SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE. 373 

man from Massachusetts, the gentleman from Tennessee said 
nothing opposed to what I have advanced ; nor have I said 
any thing opposed to what he has asserted. His charges stand 
independent of mine, and mine have no relation to his. How, 
then, they are to answer each other appears not very obvious 
to my comprehension. 

The gentleman from Massachusetts says that the Committee 
on the District of Columbia reported a bill to abolish the slave- 
trade in this district. The assertion is not sustained by the 
record. No such bill was reported. The bill to which I pre- 
sume the gentleman refers, is entitled " A bill to prohibit the 
introducing of slaves within the District of Columbia as mer- 
chandise, or for sale or hire." It does not even allude to the 
slave-trade carried on within this district. It has no reference 
to your slave-auctions ; to your slave-prisons ; to your slave- 
dealers ; to the transportation of the slaves of this district to 
southern graves. 

Sir, the history of that bill was this. After the resolution 
of the gentleman from New York (Mr. Gott) was defeated, 
there was some excitement here and in the country as to the 
manner in which the slave-trade had been upheld. The friends 
of the administration appeared to feel the pressure of public 
sentiment. The Common Council of this city adopted resolu- 
tions desiring Congress to pass a law prohibiting the bringing 
of slaves to this district for sale. This was presented to the 
House, and referred to the Committee on the District of Colum- 
bia. They reported such a bill on the 31st January. It merely 
prohibited the bringing of slaves from the surrounding country 
to this city for sale or hire. Those slaves could be sold at any 
other place. It simply refused to their owners the benefit of 
this market. All within the district were left as they had 
been, — subject to be sold and carried South. Had the bill 
passed, it would not have prevented the sale of a single slave, 
either here or elsewhere. It was a " device," a " get off," an 
apology for doing nothing. Nor did the fraud end there. The 
committee who reported, did not attempt to pass it. They 
32 



374 SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE. 

reported it to the House. That was the last that was heard 
from it. It went to the tomb of the Capulets. To me (and I 
think to all reflecting men) the transaction bears upon its face 
conclusive evidence of an intention to deceive the public. I 
felt some degree of surprise and astonishment at hearing it 
referred to as a bill to abolish the slave-trade now carried on 
here. It contains no allusion to it. The assertion that the 
committee reported such bill is entirely unfounded. 

The gentleman from Massachusetts, on my left, (Mr. Kock- 
well,) thinks I was not authorized to impute neglect to the 
Committee on Territories, in reporting a bill for organizing a 
territorial government in California. Our treaty with Mexico, 
by which that territory was obtained, bears date on the 2d 
February, 1848. It stipulated, on the part of this government, 
for the protection of the people of the territory ceded, and their 
admission to all the rights of citizens of the United States. It 
was officially proclaimed on the 4th July, 1848. From that 
moment delay could not be justified. I can find no excuse for 
the committee's neglecting to report a bill another week. The 
gentleman, in his speech, referred only to the last session. He 
attempted no excuse for the delay from the 4th of July up to 
the 14th of August, when Congress adjourned. 

Here, Sir, was ample time to have reported and passed a bill 
organizing governments in California and in New Mexico. 
But no movement on the subject took place in that committee, 
nor am I aware that any other reason for such inaction has 
ever been assigned, except that a southern candidate for Presi- 
dent had been nominated, and that the party had adopted the 
policy of inaction and delay on all matters touching slavery. I 
therefore appeal to the good sense of the House and of the 
country whether I was not fully justified in imputing neglect to 
'that committee. 

When we reassembled in December, the public mind had 
ibecome dissatisfied with the silence of this body in regard to 
those territories. It is quite certain that the public regarded 
■the delay as unreasonable. Notwithstanding the delay at the 



SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE. 375 

former session, the same committee were reappointed on the 
7th December, instead of the 10th, as the gentleman repre- 
sented. 

After this reappointment six days more elapsed, when my 
colleague introduced his resolution, peremptorily ordering the 
committee to report such bill. It was reported on the 20th; 
but was suffered to take its place on the calendar of business* 
No attempt was put forth to make it the special order for a 
day certain. There, Sir, it lay until the 15th January, when 
the gentleman from Massachusetts, (Mr. Rockwell,) not the 
chairman of the committee, moved to make it the special order 
for the 2 2d of that month. When this latter day arrived, it 
was again postponed, on motion of a southern member, until the 
30th, and finally it passed the House on the 27th February, and 
was thus sent to the Senate four days before the close of Con- 
gress. The question of neglect, I submit to the "consideration 
of all candid men. It may not attach to the gentleman on my 
right, (Mr. Eockwell,) but it must attach to the majority of the 
committee. Now, Sir, after the long delay of this committee to 
move on the question during the first session of the late Con- 
gress, at a time when the public mind had become excited by 
this extraordinary delay, it would appear that the Speaker 
might have found members here, who, if placed on the commit- 
tee, would have acted promptly and efficiently. If he had been 
anxious for the success of the measure, would he not have 
placed the power to act in the hands of men who were ready to 
exert themselves in favor of it ? 

I will now reply to some of the remarks of my colleague 
(Mr. Schenck). That gentleman, in his defence of the whig 
candidate for Speaker, was pleased to say, that the gentleman 
who filled the Speaker's chair in the last Congress (Mr. Win- 
throp) placed on the Committee upon the District of Columbia 
five members from the free, and four from the slave States* 
Now my colleague should understand that I have not objected 
to the location of any man. A slave-holder in Ohio is just as 
exceptionable as he would be, if he were from a slave State. 
Six members of that committee were supposed to be slave- 



376 SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE. 

holders, although two of them (Mr. Edwards of Ohio, and Mr. 
Ficklin of Illinois) resided in free States. Our objections are 
to the sentiments, to the principles, the doctrines, of those who 
composed that committee. 

My colleague says the gentleman from Massachusetts had, 
some years since, offered the proviso excluding slavery as an 
amendment to the Oregon bill. That is quite true. But men 
change their opinions. I ask my colleague and the country, 
why did the gentleman hesitate to avow his adherence to that 
proviso ? If he really held to it and intended to carry it out, 
why has he refused to say so at this session ? — why refuse to 
say so now ? The very fact that he remains silent on the sub- 
ject — that he refuses to avow his sentiments, satisfies me that 
I ought not to have voted for him.* 

My colleague has misrepresented me in saying that I 
demanded that the House of Representatives should come to 
me, or not be organized. I, in common with all free soilers, 
have asked them to support certain great and important princi- 
ples. We demanded that they should recognize the " self- 
evident truths " on which this government was founded. We 
desired the House to acknowledge the fundamental axiom 
" that governments are constituted for the purpose of securing 
all men in the enjoyment of their inalienable rights." The 
free soil party stand on this doctrine. From it I trust in God 
they will never depart. I hope and believe they will never 
vote for any man who refuses to acknowledge these fundamen- 
tal, these essential elements of our Government. I take this 
opportunity of saying to my colleague, that while the whig 
party denies these doctrines, or refuses to recognize them, I 
cannot and will not support it. 

My colleague has represented my objections to the gentle- 
man from Massachusetts as based solely on his opjiosition to 
the Wilmot proviso. I surely had given him no cause for such 
an assertion. My objections were based upon the whole polit- 

* When the question of adopting the proviso came before the House, subse- 
quently to the delivery of this speech, Mr. Winlhrop left the hall, and thereby 
evaded voting upon it. 



SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE. 377 

ical character of that gentleman. I refer to his celebrated toast 
at Faneuil Hall on the 4th July, 1845, in favor of Texas ; I 
refer to his motion at a whig convention in Massachusetts, in 
1847, to lay on the table the resolution of his late colleague, 
(Mr. Palfrey,) pledging the whigs of that State to oppose any 
candidate for the presidency who was in favor of extending 
slavery ; to the various demonstrations of his party ; to the 
remarks of his colleague, (who, I presume, spoke his senti- 
ments,) at the whig caucus in this city, on the Saturday eve- 
ning previous to the present session, " that the Wilmot proviso 
constituted no part of the whig policy." 

Mr. Ashmitn. To whom does the gentleman allude ? 

Mr. Giddings. To the gentleman now addressing me. 

Mr. Ashmun. I did not use such language. 

Mr. Giddings. Gentlemen have all seen the remarks to 
which I refer. I believe he said that the whigs of Massachu- 
setts, or the people of Massachusetts, made no such test. 

I have already mentioned the change of that gentleman's 
position in relation to the Mexican war, and to the arrange- 
ment of the Committees on the Judiciary, the District of 
Columbia, and the Territories. I go farther. I object to that 
gentleman on account of his having sustained for President a 
man whose education, interest, associations, and prejudices are 
opposed to freedom. The effect of the election of General 
Taylor upon the whig party has been most marked. My col- 
league has referred to the candidate of that party for Speaker, 
and says he would support any whig who had been regularly 
nominated by them. I could not go so far. While that party 
adhered to the fundamental principles of human liberty, it was 
my pride and my pleasure to act with it. It gives me no sat- 
isfaction to expose their abandonment of former doctrines* 
But my colleague has referred to the party in a manner which 
leaves me no choice. I will refer to one instance, as illustrat- 
ing the change of position by the whig party of the North. 

On the 21st December, 1847, I myself introduced to this 
body a petition from the people of this district, praying the 
abolition of the slave-trade, and moved its reference to the 
32* 



378 SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE. 

Committee on the District of Columbia, with instructions to 
report a bill in accordance with the prayer of the petition. A 
motion was made to lay my proposition on the table. The 
object of the motion appeared to be to silence all agitation on 
the subject. The whig party of the North voted against the 
motion, without a single exception. The vote was such as did 
them credit. It was such as I expected from them. Now 
mark the change ! Precisely one year subsequently, that is, 
on the 21st December, 1848, my friend from New York, on 
my right, (Mr. Gott,) introduced his resolution instructing the 
same committee to report a bill for the same purpose. Gen- 
tlemen then voted agreeably to the righteous impulses of 
their hearts. There was no time for party drill, or to bring 
the power of party discipline to bear upon members. The 
resolution was carried by a majority of eleven votes. A motion 
was made, however, to reconsider the vote adopting the reso- 
lution. This motion came up six days subsequently. A motion 
was then made to lay the proposition to reconsider on the table. 
On this vote the friends of humanity rallied, as they thought it 
the most favorable point on which to concentrate their whole 
power. If that motion had been carried, it would have left the 
resolution in full force, and a bill for abolishing that " execrable 
commerce " would have come fairly before us. We therefore 
believed that every member whose heart beat for freedom, who 
really abhorred the traffic in men, would vote with us on that 
occasion. 

But, Sir, to our disappointment and dismay, twenty-six 
northern whigs voted against laying the proposition to recon- 
sider on the table ; thereby lending their influence in favor of 
that disgraceful traffic in mankind. Thus, Sir, in the short 
space of one year and six days, a majority of the northern 
whigs then voting, faced to the right about, changed their posi- 
tion, and lent their influence to sustain the slave-trade. Why 
this change of front ? this undignified tergiversation ? Because 
General Taylor had been elected President. He was a slave- 
holder, and depended on the slave-trade to supply his planta- 
tions with laborers. To condemn that traffic would be to con- 



SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE. 379 

denm him ; to uphold that commerce would be to propitiate his 
favor. 

And now, Mr. Speaker, a word in your ear. My colleague, 
who has just addressed us with so much eloquence, who has 
referred to my humble self with so much severity, (Mr. 
Schenck,) was one who thus suddenly turned a political somer- 
set in favor of the slave-trade. 

Mr. Schenck (interposing) said he was absent when the 
resolution was adopted. That when the vote was taken upon 
laying the proposition to reconsider on the table, he opposed it, 
as he was desirous of striking out the preamble which was 
offensive to the South. 

Mr. Giddings resumed. My colleague says he was opposed 
to the preamble ; that it was offensive to the South. Was there 
any thing in it that was not strictly true ? I hope he does not 
regard truth as offensive ! That preamble is before me. Its 
language is as follows : 

" Whereas the traffic now prosecuted in this metropolis of the republic in 
human beings, as chattels, is contrary to natural justice and to the fundamental 
principles of our political system, and is notoriously a reproach to our country 
throughout Christendom, and a serious hindrance to the progress of republican 
liberty among the nations of the earth." 

To language thus true, thus appropriate, my colleague 
objects. "Why so ? On what are his objections founded ? Is 
not the slave-trade " opposed to natural justice ? " Is it not 
unjust to sell a man, — to degrade and brutalize him, — to tear 
his children from him, and sell them like brutes, — to dispose 
of his wife at auction ? Was my colleague afraid to speak 
these solemn truths in the face of the South ? Agahi ; is not 
this commerce in our own species " opposed to the fundamental 
principles of our political system ? " 

Our government is based upon the self-evident truth, " that 
all men are created equal, and are endowed with the inaliena- 
ble right to life and liberty." Now, Sir, to deny the equality 
of man's political rights, — to rob a portion of the people of 
their liberty, — to sell them like oxen in the market place, — 
to make merchandise of them, — is most obviously opposed to 



380 SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE. 

the spirit of our institutions. Again, Sir; is not this slave- 
trade a "reproach to our country ? " Does my colleague doubt 
it ? I am sure he does not. We, as a nation, have set the seal 
of our own condemnation upon it. We regard the slave-dealer 
who pursues his vocation on the eastern shore of the Atlantic 
as a pirate. Our laws pronounce him such. When taken, he 
is regarded as an outlaw, unfit to associate longer with our race. 
We hang him without mercy, and doom his memory to execra- 
tion. Yet he is far less guilty than he who follows the same 
vocation in this city. And was my colleague afraid to utter 
such palpable truths, lest southern slave-dealers should be 
offended ? He would hang one man for dealing in slaves, but 
would be cautious and delicate in the language he uses towards 
another. 

Why, Sir, if there be a crime in the universe for which I 
would hang men, it is that of dealing in mankind, — of making 
merchandise of human flesh. He who deals in slaves here, is 
far more guilty than he who follows that business in Africa. 
His victims are more enlightened, and suffer far more than the 
victims of the African slave-trade. But, Sir, did southern gen- 
tlemen object to this language ? From whence arose my col- 
league's paternal love of these slave-dealers ? Were south- 
ern members here incapable of taking care of the rights 
of the South ? I have usually found them quite willing not 
only to take care of themselves, but they are generally disposed 
to take care of the North also. This, Sir, is going a great way 
to find an excuse for upholding this slave-trade. My colleague 
out-Herod's Herod. Yet such excuses have passed current for 
forty years. 

Mr. Vinton interposed. He said when the resolution of the 
gentleman from New York (Mr. Gott) was offered, the pre- 
vious question had been called. His colleague (Mr. Giddings) 
had voted for the previous question, by which a motion to strike 
out the preamble was cut off. He had himself voted to recon- 
sider, in order to strike out the preamble. 

Mr. Giddings resumed. I am aware, said he, that my col- 
league last up, not only voted to reconsider the adoption of the 



SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE. 381 

resolution, but he also voted against laying the proposition to 
reconsider on the table. The journal also shows that my col- 
league moved to postpone the consideration of the subject for 
two weeks. He, too, it seems, was desirous of using language 
of delicacy in reference to crimes the most Heaven-daring that 
ever marked the depravity of mankind. Sir, I repeat, why 
did not my able and respected colleagues leave these objections 
to be made by slave-holders ? Why were they so fastidious as 
to the delicacy of language towards those who deal in the bones 
and muscle, the blood and sinews of their fellow men ? 

When I was interrupted by my colleague, (Mr. Schenck,) I 
was speaking of the change of the whig party after the nomi- 
nation and election of General Taylor. I had spoken of the 
manner in which the resolution of the gentleman from New 
York (Mr. Gott) was reconsidered. It was then placed on the 
list of resolutions, where it could never more be heard from. 
That was the last of it. Thus, Sir, by sheer management, the 
subject was given the "go-by." It was thus put at rest, and 
the slave-trade was upheld and sustained. More men were 
purchased, more women were obtained, and more children col- 
lected for the southern market. It was the first instance on 
the records of the nation in which the whigs of the North had 
showed themselves more servile defenders of the slave-trade 
than the northern democrats. But the truth should be spoken 
though the heavens fall. While twenty-six northern whigs 
thus lent their influence in favor of the slave-trade, only twenty- 
three northern democrats united with them in that unenviable 
exercise of political power. 

But, Sir, I am constrained to look still farther into the policy 
of the whig party, as connected with this slave-trade. I will 
not say that gentlemen voted to uphold that traffic under the 
promise or expectation of reward ; I have not the record evi- 
dence on which to base the assertion. Yet one of those gen- 
tlemen who voted thus to protect the slave-trade (Mr. Smith 
of Connecticut) received the offer of a seat in the Cabinet, but 
for some reason did not accept it; another (Mr. Preston of 
Virginia) is now a Cabinet officer ; another, (Mr. Collamer of 



382 SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE. 

Vermont,) who did not vote at that time either for or against 
the slave-trade, also holds a seat in the Executive Cabinet ; 
another (Mr. Barringer of North Carolina) represents this 
nation at the court of Madrid ; another (Mr. Marsh of Ver- 
mont) is our minister to the Grand Sultan of Turkey; another 
(Mr. Caleb B. Smith of Indiana) is commissioner of Mexican 
Claims; another (Mr. Alexander Irvin) is marshal of the 
western district of Pennsylvania; another (Mr. Edwards of 
Ohio) is a general superintendent or examiner of hospitals in 
the United States ; and the son-in-law of another, (Mr. Vin- 
ton of Ohio,) is chief clerk in the Department of the Inte- 
rior.* 

I repeat, that I cannot say that these offices were conferred 
as rewards for the votes given on the occasion referred to ; but 
it is a remarkable coincidence that not one of those gentlemen 
who opposed the slave-trade on that important vote has, so far 
as my information extends, received any favor whatever from 
the Executive. Had the same thing occurred under a demo- 
cratic administration, I should at once have characterized it as 
" a bargain and sale ; " and I think every whig would have 
sustained me in the charge. Yet now I am told that I ought 
to have voted for the gentleman from Massachusetts, for the 
reason that he belonged to the " whig party." 

Names, Sir, have little weight with me. Why, Sir, is it less 
wicked, less criminal for the whig party to sustain the slave- 
trade than it is for the democratic party ? One thing stands 
recorded upon the history of the past two years; the slave- 
trade has been sustained, protected, and upheld in this district 
during that period, while the whigs held a majority in tins hall. 
Sir, all our movements to put it down have been baffled and 
defeated. All attempts to relieve our fellow men here from 
crimes at which humanity revolts have been thwarted. These 
facts stand written, as it were, in characters of " lurid light " 
upon our country's history. They are known and read of all 



* Mr. Schenck was, soon after the delivery of this speech, appointed minis- 
ter to Brazil. 



SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE. 383 

men. Yet, Sir, I am told that free soilers, — men who hate 
oppression and detest crime, — are bound to come up to the aid 
of those who sustain these transcendent iniquities. 

Most of the old members will recollect a colored man who 
for some years waited in the refectory below us. On the week 
previous to our assembling here, as report says, he became 
alarmed at the idea of being sold South, and attempted to make 
his escape. The bloodhounds were soon upon his track. He 
was captured, and as he looked with certainty upon the fate 
that awaited him, he drew a knife from his pocket and cut his 
own throat, in the presence of his captors. He, Sir, appealed 
directly to the God of justice against this traffic, which for the 
last two years has been upheld by the whig party of this 
House. These suicides are common. Even mothers have 
been known to murder their own children, to save them from 
the tortures of this traffic. The blood of these people stains 
our garments. It is dripping from our hands. Yet we fear 
to speak forth the language of truth. We vote against resolu- 
tions for preventing these crimes, unless they are couched in 
delicate language. Yea, we are told that we must choose be- 
tween men who carefully arrange the committees of this body 
so as to protect these crimes. I deny that such obligation rests 
on us. I mean no injustice to any gentleman, when I assure 
you, that I would be as willing to go down to the corner of 
Seventh street and Delaware avenue, and select the slave- 
dealer who presides over that piratical establishment for a 
Speaker of this body, as I would vote for any man who sus- 
tains him in his hated vocation. I care not whether he be 
called a whig or democrat. Others no doubt view the subject 
differently. 

By reading the remarks of Mr. Phillips of Boston, my col- 
league has attempted to show that free soilers are in favor of a 
dissolution of the Union. He seems to have brought the paper 
containing these remarks to the House, ready folded and marked 
for the occasion ; from which I judge that these attacks were 
preconcerted, conned beforehand, and manufactured to order. 
My colleague could not have been ignorant that Mr. Phillips, 



384 SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE. 

as well as himself, is opposed entirely to the free soil party ; I 
thought it uncandid, therefore, in him, to represent that gentle- 
man as a free soiler. Such insincerity detracts from the force 
of my colleague's remarks. He would never have had re- 
course to misrepresentation, while he could find truth to sustain 
his purposes. But he intimates that there is danger of disso- 
lution of the Union, from the steady firmness with which free 
soilers press their principles. This has been the stereotyped 
argument for thirty years. It is a species of mock-thunder, 
too well understood to effect any harm. It has ceased to frighten 
the nervous misses at our boarding schools. It has become the 
jest of our school boys. 

Sir, does my colleague meet us on our principles and say 
that we are wrong? Not at all. He even professes to outdo 
us in the support of our doctrines; to go beyond us in the 
maintenance of our principles ; then he turns suddenly round 
in the same speech, and tells us that we shall produce a disso- 
lution of the Union. Would he urge us to surrender our rights 
and the rights of humanity, — permit the Constitution to be 
trampled upon, its essential elements subverted, in order to pre- 
vent southern slave-holders from seceding from the Union ? He 
will not do that. His patriotism, his independence will revolt at 
such a proposition. Does he not know that a dissolution of the 
Union would be the death of slavery ? Why, Sir, every intel- 
ligent man must be aware, that when northern freemen cease 
to uphold that institution, its death will be inevitable. South- 
ern men understand this subject ; they will be the last to seek 
a dissolution of our Federal Union. When I see the con- 
demned culprit standing upon the gallows, with the rope about 
his neck and fastened over his head, coolly kick from under 
him the platform on which he stands, and thus sever his union 
with the world in which he has lived, with the atmosphere 
which he has breathed, I may then be made to believe that 
southern men will dissolve their connection with the northern 
States. 

My colleague has commented with some freedom on the vote 
which I and some of my friends gave for the gentleman from 



SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE. 385 

Indiana, (Mr. Brown). I heard this lecture, I trust, with be- 
coming meekness. " To his own master," each of us " must 
stand or fall." Yet I am quite willing that my colleague should 
show to me this kind of paternal supervision. Free soilers, 
Sir, were determined to vote for no man who would so arrange 
the committees of this House as to sustain the slave-trade. 
"When the gentleman from Indiana became a prominent candi- 
date, my friend from Pennsylvania (Mr. Wilmot) propounded 
to him interrogatories on this subject. The gentleman from 
Indiana answered promptly and distinctly. He did not hesitate 
to place his solemn pledge to freedom on record, so that the 
whole world might see and read it. On the faith of that pledge, 
I voted for him cheerfully. I had no fears that he would vio- 
late it ; I had no suspicion that he would prove recreant to his 
faith, thus solemnly plighted. How was it with my colleague ? 
Did he vote for a candidate thus pledged ? No, Sir. He had 
no such assurance on which to rely. But intimations are ban- 
died through the public press, that the gentleman from Indiana 
would not have redeemed his pledge. 

Gentlemen have no right to assume that such violation would 
have followed his election. We were told that he served a 
long time as Secretary of the State which he in part repre- 
sents. He served here in the twenty-eighth Congress. He 
was an Assistant Postmaster-General during the administra- 
tion of Mr. Polk, and has been again returned to Congress by 
a constituency and from a State devoted to the Wilmot proviso. 
And were we to distrust the solemn word of such a man ? Sir, 
when those southern gentlemen abandoned him, they did so 
because they feared that he would prove true to freedom. 
They who had the slave interest in their keeping, believed that 
he would not answer their purpose, and they changed their 
votes to defeat his election. Will my colleague say that their 
fears were unfounded ? that they, as well as the free soilers, 
were mistaken ? 

But my colleague says the gentleman from Indiana voted 
against the proviso in the twenty-eighth Congress. This is 
true ; and so did others who now vote for it. Men change in 

33 



386 SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE. 

these days. I have already shown how twenty-six northern 
whigs wheeled entirely round in the short space of one year 
and six days. They changed from the support of human rights 
to the opposite side of that question ; whereas the gentleman 
from Indiana, in the space of four years, changed the other 
way. He once opposed the proviso ; he is now pledged to sus- 
tain it. 

But my colleague says a man must be judged by his past 
life. I have shown that the candidate for whom he voted, lent 
his official influence to sustain the slave-trade. If my colleague 
judges that gentleman by his past life, he must himself be in 
favor of that measure. Sir, you may search the journals of 
this body, but you can never find a vote of the gentleman from 
Indiana so exceptionable, so hostile to freedom, so opposed to 
humanity, as that given by those twenty-six whigs to whom I 
have referred. 

Sir, let me know that a man is right now, and I will forgive 
and overlook his past life. Had the gentleman from Massa- 
chusetts at this session, publicly avowed his adherence to the 
proviso, I should have voted for him with great pleasure. I 
could at once have forgiven and forgotten the past. That can- 
not be recalled ; its errors only can be avoided in future. All 
history and all experience show the absolute necessity of taking 
men as they now are, instead of what they have been. Paul 
was converted suddenly. Nor was he afraid or ashamed to 
avow his change from evil to that which was right and just. 

And, Sir, on this subject of slavery we have all been silent 
and supine, while slavery was subverting our interests and our 
constitutional rights. If, therefore, the lovers of freedom were 
to adopt my colleague's rule of judging men by their past con- 
duct on these questions, we should condemn all ; for all have 
sinned in this respect. My colleague, and his associates, and 
their candidate, as well as myself, would all be found wanting, 
if weighed in such a balance. 

But my colleague objects to any man who gives evidence of 
a change of mind in regard to slavery. I object to any one 
who refuses such evidence. It is said that th v e gentleman from 



SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE. 387 

Indiana pledged himself also to southern gentlemen. If such 
were the fact, it was entirely unknown to free soilers. It is cer- 
tain that he refused any written pledge to them. They wrote 
him, requesting a pledge in writing. He refused to give it. 
So did the candidate of my colleague, when addressed in that 
way. If the objection applies to one, it is equally applicable 
to the other. Sir, it was wrong in both. They should have 
spoken freely when called on. But free soilers knew nothing 
of such refusal by the gentleman from Indiana. 

Again ; it is said by southern members, that the gentleman 
from Indiana (Mr. Brown) pointed them to his past votes and 
acts for evidence as to his future course. This was precisely 
what I objected to on the part of the whig candidate. He 
pointed northern men to his past acts for proof of his future 
course, refusing to express his present views. In that way, 
were both wrong. The one deceived the North, the other 
deceived the South. The very object of a candidate's with- 
holding his views, is to deceive some of those whose votes he 
expects to receive. 

There sits the gentleman from Alabama, (Mr. Alston) ; he 
is sincerely of the opinion, that it is unconstitutional for Con- 
gress to exclude slavery from our newly acquired territory. 
He would not dare vote for a man who is known to be in favor 
of such a measure. Here is my colleague who has just ad- 
dressed us ; he holds that it is unconstitutional to permit slavery 
to exist in those territories ; nor would he support a man who 
entertains the opposite opinion. Yet, Sir, we saw these gen- 
tlemen sit here day after day, voting for the same candidate. 
Each of them, doubtless, thought he was overreaching the 
other. Each believed the other to be the dupe. Each had 
been referred to the past acts and votes of their candidates. 
Those acts and votes satisfied both ; they read to suit each ; 
ai2d each entered upon the balloting with the positive knowl- 
edge that either himself or the other must eventually be 
deceived; if they elected their candidate. It was a mutual 
attempt at fraud, — a political lottery, — a gambling transac- 



388 SPEAKER OP THE HOUSE. 

tion. Free soilers enter into no such game of chance. They 
will not unite in that political play of " blind man's buff." 

But, Sir, from the commencement of the contest for Speaker, 
free soilers at all times stood ready to aid in electing the candi- 
date of either party, if such candidate publicly adhered to the 
Wilmot proviso. This intention was made known, probably, to 
every member of this body. The gentleman from Indiana, as 
already stated, boldly and unreservedly avowed his adherence 
to that measure. I had not any doubt as to his sincerity. "With 
these views, I felt constrained, as an honest man, as an inde- 
pendent member of this body, to vote for him. With that 
belief I could not have conscientiously done otherwise. 

But my colleague appears to regard an avowal of sentiments 
as dishonorable. On this point, he will permit me to differ 
from him. I regard the withholding of a candidate's views as 
positively dishonest, and therefore dishonorable. Such I know 
to be the prevailing sentiment of northern Ohio. 

For years it has been the practice in this hall for the 
Speaker so. to arrange the committees having charge of all peti- 
tions relating to slavery, as to suppress them in the several 
committees to which they are referred. Members here from 
the North present these petitions ; they are respectfully re- 
ferred; they there remain forever unheard of afterwards. 
The representative, if called on for information, replies that he 
presented the petition ; that it was referred ; " but that the 
committee had neglected their duty in not reporting upon it." 
The constituent denounces the committee as recreant to free- 
dom ; but regards his representative as a faithful public ser- 
vant. 

Sir, he " is not aware that his representative deceives him ; 
that he has been defrauded by the very man whom he praises. 
The constituent is unconscious that his representative voted for 
the Speaker, with the full knowledge and perfect expectation 
that he would place on those committees a certain class of mem- 
bers for the very purpose of suppressing these petitions. He 
is ignorant of the fact that their suppression is as really and 



SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE. 389 

substantially the act of Ms representative, as though such repre- 
sentative had burned the petition with his own hands. This 
fraud upon the public mind should be exposed. The people of 
the North should understand it. When, two years since, I was 
assailed for refusing to vote for the gentleman from Massachu- 
setts, and published my vindication, I said to the people of my 
district, in the most emphatic language I could command, that 
their petitions in regard to this slave-trade would be suppressed 
by the committees which the Speaker had appointed. I fore- 
told the fraud about to be practised upon them. What was 
then prophecy, has now become history. During the two years 
of his administration, not one of the many thousand petitions 
against the slave-trade, sent to those committees, has since 
been heard from. 

For two years, Sir, the people of the North have been de- 
frauded, deceived, and imposed upon by the whigs of this 
House. The Constitution of our country has been violated 
and trampled under foot ; and the voice of northern philan- 
thropy has been stifled by the votes of northern whigs. Free 
soilers were lately called on to become parties to this decep- 
tion ; to approve this fraud ; to unite in these violations of the 
Constitution, by suppressing the right of petition, and to vote 
for the candidate who has thus contributed his official influence 
to consummate these infringements upon northern honor and 
northern rights. I regret that the duty of making these expo- 
sures has devolved on the humble individual who addresses 
you. I wish the task had fallen upon some one more able to 
do justice to the righteous cause we advocate. I feel, deeply 
feel, the manner in which these recorded facts involve the offi- 
cial conduct of gentlemen here. It is true that the country 
has a right to know them. Their suppression by me, would 
involve a dereliction of duty on my part ; jet, Sir, I feel an 
extreme reluctance in publishing to the world matters thus 
involving the official acts of my fellow members. I certainly 
should not have done so at the present time, except for the 
attacks made upon me. I am assailed because I will not unite 
in these deceptions, these frauds, these violations of the Con- 
33* 



390 



SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE. 



stitution, by which oppression and the slave-trade are upheld 
and maintained. 

Sir, I regard governments as constituted for the high and 
holy purpose of securing the people in the enjoyment of "life, 
liberty, and happiiiess." These undying truths were pro- 
claimed by our patriot fathers ; they were placed on record by 
them. They, Sir, were not ashamed nor afraid to avow them. 
I most solemnly, most devoutly, cherish and support them. 
Nor will I at any time sustain for the office of Speaker of this 
body, any man who disbelieves these fundamental truths, or 
who hesitates to avow them. 



CALIFORNIA. 



HER RIGHT OF ADMISSION TO THE UNION — COMPLAINTS OF SLAVE-HOLD- 
ERS—THEIR CHARACTER — CHARACTER OF OUR GOVERNMENT — ITS OB- 
JECTS DEFINED — SLAVERY IN FACT, AND IN LAW- MANNER OF ITS 
EXISTENCE— HISTORY OF ITS EXCLUSION FROM OUR TERRITORIES — 
FROM THE HIGH SEAS — ARGUMENTS EXAMINED — DOCTRINE OF LEAVING 
IT TO EXIST IN TERRITORIES REFUTED. 

[Every reader is aware that the object of the leading advocates for annexing 
Texas, and obtaining Mexican territory, was to extend and perpetuate slavery. 
But when the treaty of peace had been formed, and California came to frame 
her Constitution, she rejected the policy of holding slaves. Her Constitution 
was, however, transmitted to the House of Eepresentatives for its action upon 
the application of California for admission to the Union as a State. The 
southern members opposed its admission; and, on that occasion, Mr. Toombs, 
of Georgia, made a speech, in which he declared this to be a " slave-holding 
government," and that the " people of the free States were bound to protect the 
master in his dominion over his slaves with their blood," and that the " United 
States were bound to sustain slavery wherever our flag may float." In answer 
to these positions, Mr. Giddings delivered the following speech.] 

Mr. Chairman, — The people of California have formed 
and adopted a Constitution. Her representatives are here 
awaiting admission to this Union as one of our sister States. I 
desire to act upon this application without delay. Southern 
gentlemen, however, object to her admission, on account of that 
clause in her Constitution which excludes slavery from her ter- 
ritory. 

The advocates of liberty rejoice at this exhibition of human- 



* Speech on the President's Message communicating the Constitution of 
California. DeHvered in Committee of the whole House on the state of the 
Union. 



392 CALIFORNIA. 

ity by their brethren of that new sovereignty. Southern men, 
however, complain that Congress is encroaching upon their 
rights. Yet no one has condescended to point us to any right 
or interest in particular which he regards as encroached upon ; 
their complaints are general, without specification. 

The gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Toombs) assumed a bold 
and manly position, saying, in explicit language, " this is a pro- 
slavery government." The expression would indicate that he 
regards the object, the ulterior design of its formation, to be the 
maintenance of slavery ; that it was " constituted not to secure 
liberty," but to perpetuate slavery. This is an important dis- 
covery ; and, if correct, should be understood by the people. 
He even went farther, and declared that " we are bound to 
maintain the dominion of the slave-holder over his slaves with 
our blood, and to carry slavery wherever our flag floats, and we 
have jurisdiction." If this be so, if northern freemen are bound 
to shed their blood, in order that the southern slave-holder may 
hold his minions in subjection, that he may scourge them, 
degrade and brutalize them, our mission is certainly not envia- 
ble. The obligation of northern men to die in defence of sla- 
very must of course arise from the Constitution. And if the 
framers of that instrument intended thus to dishonor the free- 
men of the North, our curses, our heaviest execrations should 
rest upon their memories ; and the sooner such a constitution 
were discarded, and such a union were rent asunder, the better. 
There is, however, no compromise consistent with honor and 
with duty. I discard all compromises, and reject all offers to 
compromise. I came here to enforce, to carry out the provi- 
sions of the Constitution ; not to compromise, nor to surrender, 
the rights secured to us by that instrument. 

I regard the constitutional obligations of this government 
towards the institution of slavery as too obvious to be misun- 
derstood by statesmen. The line of demarcation which sepa- 
rates the people of the free States from the support of slavery 
has been so plainly drawn, that it would seem no intelligent, 
unprejudiced mind could mistake it. It is, however, true that 



CALIFORNIA. 393 

obscurity is thrown upon the subject by the ingenuity and the 
sophistry of those who profess to reason upon it. 

Much has been said about slavery being the " creature of 
municipal law." Men in both political parties now urge that 
" slavery cannot exist, unless sustained by municipal law" 
They say that this is the doctrine of jurists; that the most pro- 
found judges have so decided. Others deny this doctrine. 
Now, what is the fact ? History shows us that it was intro- 
duced into Virginia, and existed there for years before there 
was any municipal regulation concerning it. 

We know from history that it existed in each of the slave 
States of this Union long prior to the enactment of any laws on 
the subject. It found its way into Oregon, into California, 
Deseret, and New Mexico, without any law. it has been sus- 
tained in all those States and Territories, not by municipal law, 
but by the superior physical and intellectual power of the 
white over the colored people. This was slavery in fact, but 
not in laiv. For instance, — slavery continued in Ohio, even 
against the provisions of our Constitution, and in violation of 
all our laws, as late as the year 1840. It exists in Illinois to 
this day. Slaves are there bought and sold, not merely with- 
out law, but against law. 

But as the attention of the people becomes awakened to this 
subject, as information is promulgated, they enforce the laws, 
and slavery disappears at once ; or when those held as slaves 
become informed of their rights, and demand their liberty in a 
court of justice, the judge finds no law by which one man holds 
another in subjection. He calls on the claimant to show his 
authority, but no such authority is known to the law. The 
judge says " slavery is the creature of municipal law," without 
which it cannot be sustained in a court of justice. He means 
by this that no legal slavery can exist without such law. 
AThile he and all others know that men are in fact held in 
bondage against law ; that they are sold and transferred from 
owner to owner, for the reason that the laws are not enforced. 

In a state of nature, the rights of all men are equal ; but the 
superior intellectual and physical power of one man is often 



394 CALIFORNIA. 

exerted to subject others to his will. In that state, however, 
each possesses the right of self-defence. Not so in slave States. 
There the right of the slave to protect his liberty or his life is 
taken away by the laws of such State. For instance, — if a 
slave in Virginia lifts his hand against his master in self-de- 
fence, the master may at once slay him with impunity. But 
this right of the master depends on the law of that State ; and 
the moment the master goes beyond the jurisdiction of that 
State this right ceases. Let him bring his slave to Ohio, and 
the moment they stand on our soil, under the jurisdiction of our 
laws, the slave becomes a man, possessing the equal rights and 
powers and privileges with the master. Such is the case when- 
ever they go beyond the jurisdiction of Virginia into free terri- 
tory. 

These principles have often been advanced. They were 
familiar to our fathers. They had been declared by the courts 
of Great Britain, prior to our Revolution. Slavery, at that 
time was regarded as wrong, and the people of nearly every 
province were anxious to rid themselves of it. 

My colleague (Mr. Campbell) has shown, in an able manner, 
that the objects of the people of the South, before and at the 
commencement of the Revolution, was the entire abolition of 
slavery and of all slave laws. These objects were proclaimed 
in language most direct and appropriate, in 1776, when enter- 
ing upon the war of the Revolution. After the close of that 
memorable struggle, the Confederated Congress, in 1783, sent 
out an address to the people of the United States, penned by 
Mr. Madison, in which they say, "Let it be remembered, 
finally, that it has been the pride and the boast of America 
that the rights for which she contended were the rights of 
human nature." These were the sentiments and feelings then 
prevalent in all or nearly all the States. 

Our western territory was held by individual States ; Vir- 
ginia exercising jurisdiction over the greatest portion, and sla- 
very actually existing upon it. She transferred her jurisdic- 
tion to the United States, and her laws ceasing to operate 
therein, slavery of course ceased. And the ordinance of 1787 



CALIFORNIA. 395 

prohibited it from being again established there. The Conven- 
tion to frame our Constitution was then in session. They 
desired also to make the high seas free so far as American 
ships were concerned. Accordingly the States surrendered 
their jurisdiction over commerce and navigation to this govern- 
ment. We have enacted no law authorizing slavery there ; 
our flag floats proudly free upon that great highway of nations, 
giving practical contradiction to the doctrine of the gentleman 
from Georgia. He says we "are bound to carry slavery 
wherever our flag floats." "Washington and his associates, 
Jefferson, Madison, Adams, Monroe, Jackson, and their asso- 
ciates repudiated that doctrine ; and, I trust, it will ever be 
repudiated by this government. 

The gentleman cites the privilege granted in the Constitu- 
tion for the States to import slaves until 1808, as an evidence 
that we " are bound to carry slavery wherever our flag floats." 
So far from agreeing with the gentleman on this point, this pro- 
vision constitutes in my mind an irrefutable contradiction of his 
doctrine. The stipulation that Congress should not prohibit the 
importation of slaves until 1808, carried conviction to the whole 
people that it would be prohibited at that time. So far from its 
being evidence of our obligation to protect it, it furnished con- 
clusive proof that we would prohibit it. And in accordance 
with that general, that universal expectation, it was prohibited 
by act of Congress passed in December, 1807 ; and never, to 
my knowledge, has any statesman doubted the justice or consti- 
tutionality of that act until this day. The gentleman's refer- 
ence to this provision of the Constitution, shows the monstros- 
ity of his argument. 

The gentleman also cites that clause in the Constitution 
which provides for the recapture of fugitive slaves as a further 
evidence of our obligation to protect the master. I have on a 
former occasion shown, that our duties under that provision 
are simply non-interference ; to leave the master and slave to 
themselves ; we are not bound to protect the master against his 
slave ; that, if the slave in defending his liberty slays his master, 
we do not punish him. I will not, therefore, enter upon that 
argument. 



396 CALIFORNIA. 

He also insists, that slaves are property. But, on a recent 
occasion, I called attention to the fact, that slaves are referred 
to in the Constitution solely as persons, and not as property ; 
that we so regard them. And so fully has this view of the 
subject been established, that I will not detain the Committee 
by any further reply on that point. 

The next compromise of the Constitution to which the gen- 
tleman from Georgia (Mr. Toombs) refers, is that of the slave 
representation, as provided in the third clause, second section, 
of the first article of the Constitution. In regard to this article, 
it would appear that no difference of opinion could possibly 
exist. There can be no doubt that it was intended to give the 
slave States an advantage over the free States. The slaves 
are not represented in this hall, nor can we legislate for their 
benefit ; but the slave-holders have a representation here, in 
proportion to the number of slaves they hold in bondage, count- 
ing five slaves equal to three freemen. For more than sixty 
years the slave States have enjoyed this privilege. No man 
has ever denied it to be their right under the Constitution. 
But it is equally plain, that this clause was intended to give no 
farther privilege. It alludes to no other subject, and cannot be 
construed to give any other powers. The gentleman (Mr. 
Toombs) referred to it to show that this is a slave-holding gov- 
ernment; that we are bound to maintain the master's power 
over his slave with our blood ; and to carry slavery wherever 
our flag floats. But the way and manner he brings this clause 
to sustain his positions, he has failed to show us. I repeat, 
that the whole object and intention of this clause has been thus 
far observed and carried out. South Carolina has now three 
representatives on this floor more than she would be entitled to 
according to the number of her freemen ; and twenty members 
from the slave States are admitted here solely by virtue of this 
superior advantage which the slave States possess over the 
people of the North. 

It gives to the South an influence over our rights and inter- 
ests, not according to their love of freedom, but proportioned 
to their disregard of liberty. The holder of five slaves exerts 



CALIFORNIA. 397 

an influence in this hall and in the Federal Government equal 
to four citizens of the free States ; and the owner of a thousand 
slaves possesses political powers equal to six hundred citizens 
of the North. 

I know of nothing more humiliating to the pride and dignity 
of our people than this inequality of our political influence. 
We are placed in a political position between the supercilious 
master, and his crouching menial ; superior to the one, and in- 
ferior to the other. It was a compromise of northern honor ; 
it gave a bounty to oppression ; bestowed privileges upon those 
who disregard " self-evident truth," and trample upon the in- 
alienable rights of man ; it has taught northern men to regard 
slave-holders as politically entitled to superior consideration ; it 
has taught us subjection to slave-holding dictation ; yet, de- 
grading as this provision is, we have observed it strictly ; we 
have submitted to it, and I trust in God we shall stop at that 
point, and not degrade ourselves farther by going beyond the 
Constitution to retain a system of oppression which we abhor 
and detest. I can see no legitimate reason urged by the gentle- 
man why we should go beyond the Constitution, and compro- 
mise the rights secured to ourselves and to humanity by its 
adoption. 

In order to establish the duty of tins government to sustain 
slavery, we are referred to the obligation imposed upon us to 
" protect each of the States from invasion, and against domestic 
violence." 

This provision extends to the free, as well as to the slave 
States. History informs us, that the rebellion in Massachu- 
setts was the occasion of its adoption. Mr. Madison informs 
us, that members from the slave States assured the Convention 
that they neither needed nor required any provision of the 
kind. But no man can mistake the object and design of this 
section. We are bound to protect every State from invasion. 
This protection is thrown around the State, including all the 
people therein ; the righteous and the wicked, the bond and the 
free, the black and the white, the hardened assassin and the 
innocent child, are all protected against the foreign enemy. 
34 



398 CALIFORNIA. 

And you may allege that this clause was adopted to protect 
pirates and murderers, with the same propriety that you can 
assert it to have been adopted to protect slave-holders, or any 
other men of a particular character. 

The same reasoning applies to the suppression of domestic 
violence. We are bound to protect the whole people of the 
State against domestic violence. We do not institute an in- 
quiry as to the character of the people ! We do not ask whether 
they are slaves or masters, white or black, righteous or wicked. 
The insurgents are shot down by our troops, without inquiring 
who they are ! The master found in arms is shot down precisely 
as the slave, and the insurgent slave is butchered with just as 
little ceremony as the insurgent master. Indeed, we know of 
no distinctions in such case. Our troops have nothing to do 
with slavery; their duty is to quell the violence. That 
done, every slave in the State may walk off to Canada, in full 
view of our army, and they possess neither the right nor the 
constitutional power to interfere. 

But in case of invasion or of insurrection, the power of the 
government in repelling the one, or suppressing the other, is 
unlimited by the Constitution. The whole physical power of 
the nation may then be brought into action for that purpose, 
and if deemed necessary by the Executive, who is the com- 
mander of the army and navy, he may liberate every slave in 
such State for the purpose of saving the people or of restoring 
peace. This is a power, however, lying behind the Constitu- 
tion, based upon the right of self-defence, upon the duty of pre- 
serving the government, and existing only in time of foreign or 
of civil war. 

It is constantly asserted that, by adopting the Wilmot pro- 
viso, we shall " exclude the people of the South from emigrat- 
ing to those territories with their property." We are charged 
with attempting to create " distinctions between the people of 
the free and those of the slave States." These arguments are 
unfounded. The exclusion of slavery is for the express pur- 
pose of permitting all men, of every State and nation and kin- 
dred and tongue and people under heaven, to go there " upon 



CALIFORNIA. 899 

terms of perfect equality." "We propose to give to all the 
same protection, the same security to life, liberty, and property ; 
to admit of no distinctions except those of moral worth. It is 
this " equality of political rights " to which southern men object, 
and not to the want of it. Their excitement arises from the 
fact, that we recognise no distinction, that we will permit no 
man to hold the body of another at his disposal, to deprive him 
of liberty, to beat and scourge, to degrade and brutalize him. 
Such are our objects, and such are the objections to them. If, 
Sir, we permit slavery to establish itself in these territories, we 
shall show ourselves unequal to the discharge of our duties as 
statesmen, and insensible to our obligations as Christians ; we 
shall deserve, and must receive the censure, the condemnation, 
of the civilized world. 

It is not my purpose on this point to travel over ground 
already occupied. The moral turpitude of permitting slavery 
and slave markets to be established on territory hitherto conse- 
crated to freedom, has been ably examined by other gentlemen. 
There is, however, an abstraction, first advanced within the last 
two years, but now advocated by individuals of both political 
parties, denying our right to prohibit slavery in those vast 
regions. I believe the devotees of this new theory admit that, 
owning the lands, and holding the sovereignty of those territo- 
ries in our own hands, we may prohibit the robbing a man of 
his money, his watch, or his horse ; but if the robber goes far- 
ther, and commits the greatest of all possible crimes, by rob- 
bing his fellow man of his wife and children, of his liberty, his 
intellectual enjoyments, his future hopes — of himself — such rob- 
bery must be permitted, and we have no right to prohibit it. 

I stated that this theory was novel. It has certainly been 
discovered since 1776. Then our fathers declared " that gov- 
ernments were constituted for the very purpose of securing the 
people in the enjoyment of life and liberty." Now it is said 
that, in establishing government over our conquered territory, 
we must leave the question of liberty out of view, to be deter- 
mined by the people of that country. Who do gentlemen mean 
by the people ? Do they include all persons who now live in 



400 CALIFORNIA. 

New Mexico, or who shall hereafter go there ? Do they 
intend that each human being shall have a voice and a vote on 
this question of his own liberty ? Will they, by legislative 
enactment, secure the right of such vote to every man ? No, 
Sir ; such is not the intention of gentlemen who use this lan- 
guage. They intend that one portion of the people shall deter- 
mine whether they will rob another portion of their liberty, 
and hold them as property. Such is the effect of this policy ; 
yet gentlemen are unwilling to come out before the country, 
and avow this intention in undisguised language. 

Again ; it is urged that slavery cannot exist there. In the 
opening of my remarks, I showed that it has existed in Oregon 
and California ; that it now exists in Deseret ; and, if we can 
credit accounts apparently correct, it has existed in New Mex- 
ico. In my opinion, the mines of New Mexico will furnish as 
profitable employment for slaves as can be found upon the face 
of the earth ; that, if permitted, those mines will be filled with 
a dense slave population. And such we know to be the opin- 
ion of slave-holders generally ; and they are competent judges. 
I regard these arguments merely as apologies for leaving the 
question precisely as slave-holders desire it to be left. Time 
will not permit me to examine these points farther. 

These questions have no reference to the admission of Cali- 
fornia. Gentlemen seek to turn attention from the subject 
before us, under pretence that slavery has not received such 
support from this government as it ought. They know, how- 
ever, that the territory was obtained without our consent, and 
against our will. The day after war against Mexico was 
declared, I foretold to the slave-holders the very state of facts 
which now exist. I then gave them to understand that Mexi- 
cans would be no friends to slavery, and that any State we 
should obtain from Mexico would be free. Slave-holders now 
complain ; but the difficulty has been brought upon themselves 
by their attempts to strengthen slavery. California must, and 
will be admitted. 

We wish all to understand distinctly and fully our views and 
ulterior designs. We intend to limit and confine slavery to its 



CALIFORNIA. 401 

present bounds ; to repeal all acts of Congress which sustain 
that institution ; and totally to separate the people of the free 
States and the Federal Government from all responsibility of 
sustaining slavery or the slave-trade ; to restore the govern- 
ment to the position relative to that institution in which it was 
placed by the Constitution. We then hope to direct its ener- 
gies and the influence of the nation in favor of justice, of truth, 
of liberty, and of humanity. 

I am aware of the efforts now making to arrange and to com- 
promise these questions ; to quiet this agitation ; to roll back 
the tide of popular feeling now manifested, not only in our free 
States, but in Europe and throughout the civilized world. Sir, 
feeble and impotent are the powers of Congress, when brought 
in conflict with that rising voice of the people, now heard in 
every quarter of our nation. Can we, by legislation, take from 
twenty millions of freemen their consciences, their thoughts, 
their judgment ? Can we prohibit their investigations of truth ? 
This struggle has been going on for centuries. Men may 
denounce it, but it will go forward. Reforms in all ages, and 
in all nations, have been denounced. Oppression, guilt, and 
crime always seek silence and darkness ; but as intelligence 
increases, and becomes more and more generally diffused, 
abuses will be corrected, and the work of reformation will 
proceed. 

For the last twelve years I have watched the progress of 
this great political revolution. Its advance has been regular, 
constant, and uninterrupted. I have seen the influence of the 
Executive, of Congress, of the public press generally, and of 
politicians, put forth to retard its progress, but they have not 
even checked its onward course. 

The arrogance of the slave power has been beaten back ; 
the spirit of northern servility has been rebuked and brought 
into contempt ; the freedom of debate has been regained ; the 
advocates of truth and justice have increased, and are already 
seizing upon the strongholds of oppression. In our State 
Legislatures, the language of freedom and of truth finds abun- 
34* 



^02 CALIFORNIA. 

dant utterance. With the most unshaken confidence, in the 
assurance of unwavering faith, I expect, at no distant day, 
to see this government and the people of the free States 
redeemed and purified from the guilt and the crime of sla- 
very. 



NEW MEXICO. 



ITS ANCIENT BOUNDARIES — ITS GOVERNMENT— ITS CONQUEST — OUR DUTY 
TO ITS PEOPLE— CLAIMS Off TEXAS — PAYMENT OF MONEY TO TEXAS — 
ITS OBJECT — AGITATION— LAWS OF PROGRESS — THEY CANNOT BE RE- 
SISTED—DISSOLUTION OF THE UNION RIDICULED — NORTHERN SERVIL- 
ITY REPROVED. 

[Perhaps no greater fraud was ever perpetrated upon an intelligent people 
than that by which ten millions dollars was taken mostly from the laborers of 
the free States, and paid over to Texas. Some advocates of the measure pre- 
tended it was to be done as a compensation for the claims which Texas had to 
New Mexico. Others, however, admitted it to be paid' to prevent Texas from 
dissolving the Union. But the most potent cause was probably the distribution 
of Texas scrip among influential men. Three millions dollars were said to 
have been held by officers of government, agents,, and members of Congress. 
The passage of the bill above-mentioned raised the value of this scrip at least 
fifty cents on the dollar, and hundreds of splendid foi-tunes were supposed to 
have been realized for services rendered in obtaining the passage of said bill. 
While it was under consideration, Mr. Giddings delivered the following speech.] 

Mr. Chairman, — I should do injustice to my own feelings 
were I to withhold an expression of my views upon this subject, 
of establishing the boundaries of Texas, and paying to her 
ten millions dollars from the public treasury. 

To the great joy of the northern people, generally, as well 
as to a portion of those residing in the slave States, the " com- 
promise bill" has been defeated in the Senate. But, while 
the public are rejoicing over that fortunate termination of eight 

* Speech on the bill to establish the boundaries of New Mexico and Texas. 
Delivered in Committee of the whole House on the state of the Union, August 
13, 1850. 



404 NEW MEXICO. 

months' labor of that body, they have suddenly sent us this 
bill containing the most exceptionable features of that com- 
promise. In fact, the bill now on your table is more objection- 
able in its provisions than the compromise itself. Senators 
who voted for striking these provisions from the "omnibus 
bill," have turned round and voted for them in the bill before 
us. And we are now told that they are to be carried through 
this body by " whig votes." This rumor, I hope, may prove 
unfounded ; time will soon disclose its truth, or its falsehood. 

I, Sir, am entirely opposed to the bill, or rather to its two prin- 
cipal features, to wit, that which gives to Texas some forty 
thousand square miles of territory within the ancient boun- 
daries of New Mexico, and that which provides for the pay- 
ment to Texas of ten millions of dollars from our treasury. 
My objections to each of these provisions are inseparable. On 
a former occasion,, I fully examined the boundaries of Texas.* 
I do not hesitate to say, that no man here or elsewhere, who 
professes ordinary intelligence on that subject, believes Texas 
to have any right whatever within the ancient bounds of New 
Mexico. 

Mr. Polk, in his annual message of 1846, declares that 
" New Mexico, with its capital, Santa Fe, had been captured 
by our arms." He, Sir, regarded New Mexico as an unit, a 
State with its capital; as conquered from the enemy; not as 
belonging to Texas. The absurd thought of its being a por- 
tion of Texas had not entered the Executive mind. But we 
are now told that it belonged to Texas after she declared it so 
in 1836. It is certain that Mr. Polk did not regard it such. 
He did not enforce Texian laws ; nor did he pay any regard 
whatever to Texian authority. No, Sir; he established a 
military code of laws. The system bore no similitude to that 
of Texas. It was the code of New Mexico. Under it, claims 
were litigated ; criminals were tried, convicted, and executed. 
To this day those laws are in force. They have been main- 
tained and executed throughout New Mexico. This was done 

* Vide Speech on President's Message of 1846. 



NEW MEXICO. 405 

by a democratic administration. We are now called on, under 
a whig administration, to surrender up a portion of this terri- 
tory, and to purchase the remainder at ten millions dollars. 
Will ive do it ? After giving Texas one half, we are called on 
to pay her for the other a greater sum than the whole of Texas 
and New Mexico are both worth. And this, we are told, is to 
be done by aid of " wing votes." I hope, for the honor of the 
whig party, that these intimations are unfounded. 

Why, Sir, to this hour, no northern whig ever admitted that 
Texas possessed a shadow of claim to any portion of this terri- 
tory. Indeed those northern whigs who now urge the passage 
of this bill do not pretend that Texas has any right or title to 
any portion of New Mexico. All northern members of that 
party, both in and out of Congress, wholly and totally deny 
such right. The only reason assigned for thus delivering up 
this free territory to the curse of slavery, is to pacify Texas, 
and appease the slave power ; to quiet their clamor ; to induce 
Texas to abstain from dissolving the Union; to purchase 
clemency and mercy at her hands. Let those northern mem- 
bers vote for that measure whose spirit and feelings are so 
abject, so servile, as to permit them ; but surely no independent 
statesman will do it. 

Again, Mr. Chairman, if this territory belongs to Texas, let 
her have it. I would not keep it from her. If it be a portion 
of New Mexico, it belongs to us, and none but a craven heart 
would surrender it. Yet, Sir, we are told that it is to be done 
by whig votes. Let the degrading act be consummated ; let 
northern honor be surrendered ; but let those who do it place 
their names upon record ; let this act go to the country ; let 
the North know who it is that betrays her interests, and the 
interests of humanity. 

You, Mr. Chairman, belong to one section of our Union — I 
to another. Whatever belongs to you under the Constitution, 
I am willing you should enjoy ; whatever belongs to the people 
of the North, shall never be surrendered by my vote, or with 
my consent. I repudiate and detest the policy of surrendering 
up a portion of our rights, in order to purchase a recognition 



406 NEW MEXICO. 

of other interests. Such policy belongs not to independent 
freemen. 

But, Sir, the worst feature of this bill is that which proposes 
to purchase of Texas this territory which already belongs to 
us; which was first conquered, and then purchased from 
Mexico. This ten millions of money is to be drawn from the 
pockets of our people and handed over to Texas ; not because 
she has any shadow of title to this territory; not for any 
property or jurisdiction she possesses there — no such thing 
is urged by northern men. Why, then, shall we pay her 
that vast amount ? The only answer is, we must do it " to 
save the Union ! " To buy of Texas the privilege of con- 
tinuing this government ! To induce her to remain with us, 
and not to sever the tender and interesting relations existing 
between her and the other States. Why, Sir, they were 
brought into connection with us for the purpose of making 
northern freemen sustain her slavery ; and now we are to be 
taxed ten millions dollars for the privilege of supporting this 
vilest system of oppression that ever disgraced civilized man. 

Mr. Howard said, that Texas did not seek annexation to 
the United States ; nor does she ask compensation for the 
territory ; nor was he certain that she would take it. 

Mr. Giddings. It cannot have escaped the recollection of 
any member, that Texas, in 1837, sent her agent here to solicit 
annexation to our Union ! 

Mr. Howard. But she withdrew it. 

Mr. Giddings. And waited until she could induce our 
u charge d'affaires," Mr. Murphy, to recommend her annexa- 
tion to this Union. And as to accepting the money, I wish 
she might reject the offer, if tendered. But during the whole 
session has she not, by her agent, like the daughters of the 
horse-leech, cried give, give, give ? Her Senators voted for 
this bill to tax the people of the free States to the very modest 
amount of ten millions of dollars, and to give it over to the 
holders of Texas scrip. Had not those Senators voted for the 
bill, it would have been defeated. But, Sir, who is Texas, that 
she should make such demands of this government? How 



NEW MEXICO. 407 

came she to be a member of this confederacy ? The treaty- 
making power, the only constitutional tribunal capable of 
admitting her as a member of this confederacy, rejected the 
application. She then " climbed up some other way." She 
consented to come in by joint resolution, which, as the present 
Secretary of State then showed, was entirely unconstitutional, 
null and void. The resolutions may be repealed to-morrow, or 
at any moment when a majority of the two Houses shall think 
best. That would leave Texas as we found her. She now 
holds no constitutional position here ; nor have her Representa- 
tives any more right under the Constitution to hold seats in 
this hall, than have the subjects of the Grand Sultan, or of the 
Emperor of Russia. Yet she attempts to lay the nation under 
contribution for her aggrandizement. If she were to ask for 
ten or fifteen millions as a consideration for leaving us — for 
going out of the Union — for ceasing to trouble us, I might, 
perhaps, vote for it. But I will never consent to give her the 
first dime to retain her in the Union. 

Sir, can we, can our constituents forget the consequences of 
her annexation? the long, bloody, piratical war in which it 
involved us ? the hundred and fifty millions dollars debt which 
she entailed upon us ? the thirty thousand valuable lives she 
cost us ? And shall we now crown this series of outrages upon 
the free States, by paying her ten millions of dollars for thus 
bringing upon us the curse and crimes of such a war, — and of 
slavery ? 

Mr. Howard. Why does the gentleman seek to send an 
army to Texas, if we do not belong to the Union ? 

Mr. Giddings. I never thought of sending an army to 
Texas. I abhor offensive wars ; and if Texas please to go out 
of the Union, she shall never be called to an account for it by 
force of arms, if my vote or influence can prevent it. But I 
believe in the right and duty of self-defence, and I would bring 
the whole military force of the nation to the defence of New 
Mexico, if necessary to preserve her boundaries, and to pro- 
tect her people ; and I would welcome every hostile Texian 
who comes there with arms in his hands, to a "hospitable 



408 NEW MEXICO. 

grave." While I say this, I repeat that I would oppose the 
march of an army to Texas, or to any other State who may 
secede from the Union. I would not seek to compel them to 
remain with us by force of arms. I do not believe in a govern- 
ment of bayonets and of gunpowder, at this age of the world. 

The people and each State must govern themselves ; or if 
they see fit to leave the Union, I would say, " Go in peace, and 
may the blessing of God rest upon you" I would neither shoot 
them, nor cut their throats for thinking they can do better out 
of the Union than in it. But when they shall once have left 
the Union, I will never consent to their return, until they shall 
become so far civilized and christianized as to purify them- 
selves from slavery. These are my views in regard to attempt- 
ing to hold States in this Union by fear of the sword. Our 
Union cannot be preserved in that way. It must be sustained 
by making it the dispenser of constitutional justice to all the 
States, the instrument for maintaining the rights of all. 

Sir, the payment of this ten millions of dollars constituted 
the most objectionable feature of the " omnibus bill." It is 
designed to raise Texas scrip from fifteen cents upon the dollar 
to " par value ; " to make every dollar of Texas scrip worth 
six and a half; to make splendid fortunes in a short time; to 
rob the people, the laboring men of the nation, of this vast 
sum, and place it in the hands of " stock-jobbers " and " gam- 
blers in Texas scrip." 

And this is said to be whig policy, — the policy of the new 
administration ! Such is the language of the President's organ 
of this morning. I hope it is not the case. I am unwilling to 
believe it. This policy is a strong and direct appeal to those 
members, if any, who are interested in Texian stocks. If I 
knew it were true that one or two million dollars was owned 
by individuals on this floor, I should regard the fate of the bill 
; as settled ; but it would not be in order, under parliamentary 
rules, to suppose such a fact to exist. I therefore would not 
insinuate it ; yet should the bill pass, I shall ever believe that 
considerations, unseen by the public eye, have co-operated with 
JExecutive influence to produce that result. I do not believe 



NEW MEXICO. 409 

the President's favor sufficient, at this time, to secure the sup- 
port of a majority of the House for such an object. 

Sir, certain Senators in the other end of the capitol, have 
for months been endeavoring to convince the people of the 
necessity of passing the " omnibus bill," as it is called. No 
arguments could be raised in favor of that measure, for it was 
not founded on reason. One consideration alone was pressed 
upon the public mind. The cry was raised that "the Union 
was in danger 1 " The newspapers here responded, " the 
Union is in danger / 1 " The country press repeated the 
alarm. The cry was caught up and echoed by every timid, fal- 
tering poltroon of the North. Petitions to " save the Union " 
were circulated. Public meetings were held in our commercial 
cities where Texas scrip was mostly influential, and resolutions 
were adopted " to save the Union." Fourth of July orations 
were delivered, and theological pamphlets were published, and 
morning prayers were put up in this hall to " save the Union." 
The supplications were not that we " may legislate in righteous- 
ness" deal out justice and mercy to those who are oppressed 
and degraded by our laws. These were regarded as objects of 
trifling importance, when compared with the pending danger 
that Texas would dissolve the Union. Indeed, they are never 
mentioned by our chaplain. 

Sir, I am nauseated, sickened at this moral and political 
effeminacy; this downright cowardice. It is unworthy of 
American statesmen. Our constituents sent us here to main- 
tain and defend their rights ; not to surrender them ; not to 
make ourselves and our people tributary to Texas. In elect- 
ing us, they had no expectation that we would turn upon them 
and violently thrust our hands into their pockets and take 
therefrom ten millions of dollars, and hand it over to the slave- 
holders of Texas, for territory which belongs to us, and to 
which Texas never had any title whatever. 

Sir, gentlemen here may say what they please ; the people 

have no fears of a dissolution of the Union. They understand 

this kind of gasconade. The cry of " dissolution " has been the 

dernier resort of southern men for fifty years, whenever they 

35 



410 NEW MEXICO. 

desired to frighten doughfaces into a compliance with their 
measures. It may alarm gentlemen here ; but I do not think 
you can find in northern Ohio an equal number of nervous old 
women or of love-sick girls, who could be moved by it. 

Again, it is said that we must stop this agitation in relation 
to slavery ! The people see us here passing laws to enslave 
our fellow men ; to sell women in open market ; to create a 
traffic in the bodies of children. They know this to be opposed 
to the self-evident truth that "all men are created equal," 
" that governments are constituted to sustain that equality of 
rights ; " and they converse on the subject, examine the reasons 
on which such traffic is based, and vote for men who will op- 
pose such barbarous practices. This is called agitation ; and 
gentlemen here talk of suppressing it by passing such laws as 
that on your table. This is the manner in which we are to 
stop the progress of truth ; to seal the lips of philanthropists ; 
and to silence the voice of humanity. Yes, Sir ; it is gravely 
proposed that we should set bounds to the human intellect, and 
to limit political investigations by statute laws. 

Sir, the great founder of our holy religion, when he pro- 
claimed the Heaven-born truths of his Gospel, was denounced 
as an " agitator" He was arrested, condemned, and executed 
for asserting truths which the Scribes and Pharisees were too 
stupid to comprehend. It was done to stop agitation ; but 
truth, emanating from " the Holy One," has extended, spread, 
and progressed, and will " go on conquering and to conquer," 
in spite of all the political Scribes and Pharisees in Congress, 
and the quaking and trembling of doughfaces here and else- 
where. 

This progress in morals and in political intelligence, is in 
strict accordance with the law of our being, and cannot be pre- 
vented. The idea of setting bounds to the human intellect, of 
circumscribing it by statute law, is preposterous. Why not 
limit the arts and sciences by conservative legislation, as well 
as moral and political progress ? Why not follow the example 
of those who attempted to stop the agitation of Galileo, when 
he proclaimed the truth of our solar system, and the laws by 



NEW MEXICO. 411 

which the planets are retained in their orbits? He caused 
great agitation, and was excommunicated for his infidelity, in 
thus daring to proclaim truths which the conservatives of that 
age were too ignorant to comprehend. It required two hun- 
dred and fifty years for the stupid clergy of that day, to under- 
stand the truths for which he had been expelled from their 
Christian fellowship. How long it will require certain theo- 
logical professors of the present day, to comprehend the " self- 
evident truths" of man's equality, is not yet determined. Or 
how long it will require our political doctors to comprehend the 
very obvious fact that an educated and reflecting people will 
think and act for themselves, is yet to be ascertained. 

But, if we are to have conservative legislation, let us tear 
down the telegraphic wires, break up our galvanic batteries, 
and imprison Morse, and stop all agitation upon the subject of 
your "magnetic railroads of thought." Lay up your steam- 
boats, place fetters upon your locomotives, convert your rail- 
roads into cultivated fields, and erase the name of Fulton from 
our history. Go down to yonder Institute ; drive Page from 
his laboratory, break in pieces his galvanic engines, and unchain 
the imprisoned lightning which is there pent up ; then pass an 
act of Congress prohibiting all further agitation on these sub- 
jects, and thus carry out your conservative principles, of which 
some men are continually boasting. 

Sir, this, above all others, is an age of progress. Look at 
the peasantry of Europe. They are struggling against oppres- 
sion. Ground down by the iron heel of despotism for centu- 
ries, they are rising in their might, and teaching tyrants to 
understand the power that dwells with the people. While 
these political revolutions were convulsing kingdoms, overturn- 
ing thrones, — while crowns were tossed about like the baubles 
of children, — Le Verrier, alone in his study, was agitating a 
question of science. By a course of observations and mathe- 
matical calculations, he demonstrated the existence of another 
planet ; far, far away in unlimited space, infinitely beyond the 
utmost bounds to which even the thoughts of former astrono- 
mers had extended. So, Sir, the philosophical statesmen of 



412 NEW MEXICO. 

our own land, reasoning from past observations, and drawing 
reasonable deductions for the future, see clearly in the distance 
the star of freedom, shining and glittering in refulgent splendor, 
far beyond those regions of thought within which the mind of 
our political savans are accustomed to revolve. Those savans 
and political doctors will talk of " conservatism," and of " quiet- 
ing agitation." They are behind the age in which they live ; 
and there they will probably remain. 

I know it is said that we must quiet these agitations before 
Congress will act upon a tariff, and other old party issues. Let 
me assure gentlemen that revolutions never go backward. It 
is too late in the day to make intelligent men believe that you 
have any very pure regard for the laboring men of New Eng- 
land, while you sustain laws here to sell the laboring men and 
women of this district, like brutes in the market ; that you 
have any real intention to pass laws for the relief of the labor- 
ing men of the North, while you keep in force laws for carry- 
ing on a coastwise commerce in the bodies of southern laborers. 
Such pretences a; ; ihallow, and no intelligent man will regard 
them as sincere. 

But I ask gentlemen if they really feel capable of convincing 
the people of the North that it is our duty to give Texas a 
large portion of New Mexico, and then pay her ten millions of 
dollars for taking it? Let gentlemen go to the dairymen, the 
farmers and mechanics of northern Ohio, — and nine out of 
every ten are as correct judges as we are of the boundaries of 
New Mexico, and of the propriety of maintaining them, as 
well as of admitting California and New Mexico when they 
present their constitutions. They will judge for themselves, 
too, when we take from their pockets ten millions of dollars 
for Texas. I should like to hear gentlemen who now advocate 
this bill, undertake to make those farmers and mechanics be- 
lieve that it is their duty to contribute a portion of the sub- 
stance, accumulated by their toil, to make up this tribute to 
Texas. I imagine they would find the task a difficult one. 

Sir, if you wish to create agitation among them, pass this 
hill! Take from their hard earnings this ten millions of money 



NEW MEXICO. 413 

and pay it over to Texas, and I will promise you agitation, 
increased agitation. Let northern men vote thus to render 
their constituents tributary to Texas, and such representatives 
will find agitation at home ; agitation that, like Banquo's ghost, 
will not " down at their bidding." 

For seven months, we have been debating the admission of 
California. Her senators and representatives have been wait- 
ing here, respectfully asking admission, to which there is no 
real objection. But that subject has been delayed, postponed, 
and put off, from time to time, without any earthly excuse. 
Northern whigs and northern democrats were not prepared to 
act upon this matter. They desired to wait for the Senate to 
act upon it. It has been in vain that we have called on them, 
and solicited and importuned them to act on this plainest of all 
questions ever presented to this body. Well, Sir, the bills ad- 
mitting California have been laid aside in both Houses, and 
this bill to give Texas a State carved' from New Mexico, and 
to tax our people to supply the coffers of Texas, is on your 
table ; and the very men who have urged further delay in 
regard to California, after the bill had been discussed for seven 
months, now turn round and are willing to pass this most 
objectionable measure without discussion. These sudden 
changes of position appear unaccountable to those who are 
not initiated into sueh political mysteries. Why is this delay 
of one measure, and this hot haste to dispose of another? 
Why, Sir, there is but one answer, — the slave power com- 
mands ; and northern servility obeys. 

We are told that the President is anxious for the settlement 
of these questions, and his late message shows such to be the 
case. To this message I will now ask a moment's attention. 

So far as it treats of our rights to the entire territory of New 
Mexico, and the duties of the Executive to protect and defend 
the people and territory until Congress shall dispose of the 
subject, its doctrine is sound and its argument conclusive. To 
this extent I believe the people of the free States, including all' 
political parties, will sustain and uphold the doctrines of the 
35* 



414 NEW MEXICO. 

message ; and they will stand ready at all times to aid and 
assist the President, in carrying them into effect. 

Sir, I take this opportunity to declare, that neither myself, 
nor the political friends with whom I act, are disposed to make 
war on any man or any party. We are contending for what 
we deem great and paramount principles ; and so far as the 
President and his party shall carry out our doctrines, we shall 
rejoice to act with him ; and whenever he or his party departs 
from the essential doctrines on which our government rests, or 
adopts a policy opposed to justice, or to the rights of the peo- 
ple, we shall freely express our disapprobation and make known 
our objections. We shall expose his errors with the same 
freedom that we sustain him when right. I therefore repeat, 
and I take pleasure in saying, that to the extent before stated, 
the message is right and satisfactory, and will be supported. 

But when the President goes on to describe the dangers 
arising to our Union from the blustering of Texas, and more 
than intimates the propriety of our paying Texas for a portion 
of New Mexico, merely to purchase her silence, and to hire 
her not to intimidate us, I feel constrained to say that I regard 
such intimations as unworthy of his high station. It is undig- 
nified, and bespeaks a timidity unbecoming the Chief Magis- 
trate of a mighty nation. No man can mistake the President's 
anxiety for the safety of the Union, which none ought for a 
moment to regard as endangered ; and his anxiety also to make 
peace with Texas, without very particular regard to the terms 
on which it shall be obtained, is too apparent to be misunder- 
stood. 

Every attentive reader of the message must be satisfied that 
it begins with General Taylor's policy, and ends with that of 
the Secretary of State. It begins boldly, but ends pusillani- 
mously. It commences by a fair maintenance of our rights, 
and closes by advising us to purchase safety of Texas. It 
opens by informing Texas that she must submit to constitutional 
authority, and concludes by intimating that she shall be well 
paid if she will abide in the Union with us. 

The message was most evidently intended to facilitate the 



NEW MEXICO. 415 

passage of the bills to which I had referred. Indeed, the 
National Intelligencer, the organ of the President, comes out 
this morning giving a programme of our action upon these 
measures. It not only informs its readers that these objection- 
able bills are to pass this body, but it descends to the detail, and 
gives us distinctly to understand that they are to be acted upon 
" in the order in which the Senate sends them to us." It gives 
us the assurance that this bill giving up a portion of New 
Mexico to Texas, and paying her ten millions to take it, is in 
perfect accordance with the Executive views. We are also 
told that we are to have no farther delay, that the session 
ought to be brought to a close, and that these bills must not 
detain Congress at this season of the year. 

Why, Sir, these admonitions, coming from such a quarter, 
are surely worthy of consideration. I have this morning heard 
it suggested that the whole thing was arranged and agreed upon 
before the " compromise bill " was defeated in the Senate. 
That leading members, at both ends of the capitol, concluded 
to force these bills through this body under the screw of the 
previous question, without discussing or amending them. And 
this, I understand, is to be effected by " whig votes." I shall 
await these movements with great interest. To this day, as I 
have remarked, the entire whig party of the North has at all 
times and under all circumstances denied that Texas possesses 
title to any portion of Mexico. I am unwilling to believe they 
will now throw a political somerset, and admit that she has 
title there, and vote for paying her ten millions of dollars for 
it ; " but we shall see what we shall see." 

Representatives here have learned that there is a power not 
behind, but above the throne — one that will command obedi- 
ence even from the President himself. When General Taylor 
first ascended the presidential chair, he was anxious for the 
establishment of civil governments in California and New 
Mexico. All will recollect his anxiety to save the people there 
from the government of the bowie-knife and pistol. 

Sir, a few free soilers, aided by whigs and democrats, resisted 
the establishment of such governments unless slavery were 



416 NEW MEXICO. 

excluded. The indignant frowns of the President were threat- 
ened to be poured out upon the free soil party, if they again 
opposed that measure. These threats had no effect. Free 
soilers and the people stood firm. General Taylor saw the 
course of public sentiment and wisely changed his policy, and 
himself opposed the establishment of civil governments in our 
territories, to which the whole whig party responded, Amen. 
General Taylor now sleeps with his fathers. " Peace to his 
ashes." 

But a generation of whigs has now risen up, who seem not 
to have known General Taylor, or his policy, who now turn 
their backs upon his plan, and vote for civil governments in 
Utah and New Mexico without any exclusion of slavery. 
"Well, Mr. Chairman, it is the duty of the soldier to face to the 
right, or to the left, or to right about, according to the word of 
the drill-sergeant. We shall soon have the opportunity of 
witnessing the manner in which these subsidized troops obey 
the word, and how many whigs will now " take their turn upon 
the springboard," and give us specimens of " ground and lofty 
tumbling." 

This, Sir, was the principal object for which I rose. I 
wished to call the attention of the House and of the country 
to the alacrity with which members here change their position, 
and vote in direct opposition to their former professions. Why, 
Sir, it is known to the whole country, that two years since the 
entire whig party North, stood pledged to the establishment of 
governments in our territories, with the proviso excluding 
slavery. I think on various occasions every northern whig 
member voted for it. The proviso or no proviso, was the issue 
in all the northern States in the presidential canvass of 1848. 
On this issue General Taylor was elected, and General Cass 
was defeated. When General Taylor avowed his doctrine of 
non-action, the whigs changed their position and sustained that 
policy. Now, Sir, we are told they are to take one step more. 
They must go for territorial governments in Utah [and New 
Mexico, without the proviso. This, we are told, is the plan 
agreed upon — one which is warmly advocated by the organs 



NEW MEXICO. 417 

of the party here. This will bring them, as a party, entirely 
round into the loco-foco doctrines of General Cass in 1848. 

These measures — that is, the establishment of civil govern- 
ment in Utah and New Mexico ; the establishment of the 
boundary line between Texas and New Mexico ; and, to crown 
all, a bill for compelling northern freemen to become the catch- 
poles of southern slave-holders, were all suggested by the 
present Secretary of State, some five months since, while a 
member of the Senate. They were then regarded as odious 
by nine-tenths of the entire whig party North. They were 
then looked upon with disgust, and their author with general 
disfavor. He is now at the head of the Cabinet. All his 
measures, odious as they are, are now pressed upon Congress, 
sustained by the executive organ, and said to be a part of the 
Executive policy. I hope it is not so; I am unwilling to 
believe it ; yet when I look back to the avowals of the Secre- 
tary of State while in the Senate, and bear in mind that he was 
selected to the premiership while openly advocating these 
measures — whea I see them sustained by his leading and con- 
fidential friends in this hall, and in the other e^d of the capitol, 
and by leading whig papers, I am unabie to resist the conviction 
that the President favors them. I am conscious that he can- 
not do it from a love of slavery. His message unfolds the 
secretly operating cause. It is the fear of domestic violence, 
of civil war with Texas. 

Southern gasconade has excited alarm in older men than the 
President. It has been the usual weapon with which to assail 
the North for the last fifty years. I think the time has arrived 
when it should be regarded by the President, and by Congress. 
If Texas and other southern States have determined to secede 
from the Union, the paying of ten millions of dollars will 
satisfy them only for the moment ; other and more extravagant 
demands will soon be made. Indeed we know, that most of 
the southern malecontents make the rejection of California the 
test of abiding in the Union. They assure us that the Union 
shall be dissolved, if California be admitted. To yield to these 
demands, is to admit that we have no government, nor an asso- 



418 NEW MEXICO. 

ciation that is competent to exercise the functions of a govern- 
ment. And this vast sum which we are to pay Texas, is to 
reward her for abiding in the Union. No northern man 
pretends the money is to be paid for any other purpose. Those 
who advocate its payment, all admit it is to " buy our peace " 
with her. If she remain with us, she will do so for hire — 
for a compensation paid by northern men. 

Sir, I have no language to express the feelings which this 
proposition creates in my own mind. Those who wield the 
government of Texas, must have great contempt for her peo- 
ple, or they would not for a moment attempt to sell her 
allegiance in this manner. And we, Sir, must hold them as 
exceedingly degraded, or we would not attempt to purchase 
their fidelity by dollars and cents. 

Of what possible benefit can Texas be to this Union ? Since 
she professed to belong to it, we have been at constant and 
heavy expense to protect her against the miserable hordes of 
savages who infest her borders. For the transportation of her 
mails, the people of our free States pay a heavy sum yearly ; 
and the keeping up of custom-houses requires a large annual 
appropriation beyond all the revenue they collect. We are 
constrained to pay our judges, marshals, and district attorneys 
for that State, in order to maintain a judiciary there. In short, 
under ordinary circumstance, every laborer of the North pays 
from his earnings an annual contribution to maintain the govern- 
ment of Texas. We all know these facts ; and from the nature 
of her soil and population, she will probably continue to be an 
expense to us for the next half century. And now we are 
called on to pay her ten millions dollars for the privilege of 
continuing this yearly burden upon our people. Why, Sir, this 
was all foreseen at the time of her annexation, and the policy 
of forming a union with her was based upon the expectation 
that " it would extend and perpetuate slavery." If, therefore, 
we pay this money, it must be paid for that purpose. This 
truth should be distinctly understood by every northern man. 

Before I conclude, it is due to myself, and to the political 
friends with whom I act, that I should say, we have done all 



NEW MEXICO. 419 

in our power to avoid the present aspect of this question. It 
was our wish to have disposed of the California bill at an early- 
day, and in the ordinary course of legislation. We foresaw 
the difficulties now before us, and endeavored to avoid them. 
But gentlemen now in favor of this measure were anxious to 
delay final action in regard to the admission of California. 
That important measure, in regard to which our duties were so 
plain, has been put off, and delayed in every possible manner. 
We are urged to await the action of the Senate, to see what 
they would do in regard to it. Well, Sir, counsels other than 
ours have prevailed. We have awaited the action of the Sen- 
ate ; they have sent us a bill establishing a civil government in 
Utah, and this bill to establish the boundaries of Texas and 
New Mexico. These, in the order of business, now precede the 
bill admitting California — we must act on them first. And 
I we are told plainly that if we pass these bills, we may then 
' take up and pass that admitting California. But we are also 
I assured, that if we reject these bills, " California shall not be 
, admitted ; " that southern gentlemen will, by a factious course 
I here, defeat all attempts to legislate on that subject ; in other 
words, we must pass this bill giving to Texas money to pay 
her debt, or our government is to he brought to an end. We 
are to legislate under this kind of duress. 

Sir, I stand here as a free man, the representative of free- 
men. Thank God, I represent no slaves. I feel conscious 
that I could offer my constituency no greater insult than to vote 
for this bill — I shall not do it. If the stability of our Union 
j were to depend on the passage of that bill, I would spurn it 
with indignation. Never, Sir, under any combination of influ- 
ences, of interests, or of political considerations, will I consent 
to the passage of any law taxing the people of Ohio to pay 
the debts of Texas. 



i 



ANNUAL MESSAGE OF THE PRESIDENT.* 



DECLARATION OF HIS PRESENT POSITION — HIS FORMER DOCTRINES — HIS 
CHANGE OF PRINCIPLES— HIS VIOLATIONS OF WHIG PRINCIPLES— HIS 
DEVOTION TO SLAVERY— HIS FRIENDSHIP FOR THE "FUGITIVE LAW" — 
THE CHARACTER OF THAT LAW— ITS BARBARITY EXPOSED— ITS UNCON- 
STITUTIONALITY— FEELING OF THE NORTHERN PEOPLE. 

[During the Presidential campaign of 1848, the advocates of freedom were 
urged to support the whig candidates, for the reason that Mr. Fillmore was an 
avowed supporter of liberty. It was also understood, that General Taylor had 
taken position, with his cabinet, against the organization of territorial govern- 
ments in Utah and New Mexico ; and in favor of admitting them as States so soon 
as they should form State Constitutions, and ask admission to the Union. Upon 
the death of General Taylor, this policy was entirely changed. Mr. Webster, 
while in the Senate, on the 7th March, had laid down the programme of " com- 
promise measures," which for their servility to southern dictation were con- 
demned by most northern men. This speech of Mr. Webster was a very clear 
indication of his hostility to General Taylor's policy. When Mr. Fillmore 
assumed the Executive duties, after the death of the President, he called Mr. 
Webster to the office of Secretary of State, and in that capacity he was 
regarded as giving dictation to the policy of the administration, and as princi- 
pal author of the message under consideration, when the following speech was 
delivered.] 

Mr. Chairman, — The President's message is now before 
us, and I avail myself of a long established custom to express 
my views in relation to the doctrines and policy avowed by the 
Executive. For the frankness with which the President 
declares his positions upon the interesting questions which 

* Speech on the annual Message of the President, of December, 1850. 
Delivered in Committee of whole House on the State of the Union, December 
9, 1850. 



ANNUAL MESSAGE OP THE PRESIDENT. 421 

now agitate the public mind, I tender him my thanks. It was 
due to himself, to his political friends, and to the country, that 
his views on these questions should be distinctly set forth ; that 
the nation should understand whether he is for or against this 
fugitive law, now so odious throughout the free States. 

I approve the doctrine which the President lays down 
respecting the exercise of his veto power. I regard it as the 
doctrine of the Constitution. It is true, however, that it 
overthrows and wholly discards the avowed policy of the party 
which elected him. The party declared its doctrine to be, that 
the veto power should never be exercised, except when the bill 
presented for the President's approval was clearly unconstitu- 
tional. 

This doctrine the President repudiates, and gees as far in 
the support of that prerogative as Jackson, or Tyler, or Polk. 
I approve this independence, this casting aside the trammels of 
party. I am now curious to see how many of those friends 
will turn round and go with the President in this change of 
doctrine. 

But, by looking at the latter part of the message, it becomes 
evident that the President intends the country shall under- 
stand that he will veto any bill for the repeal of the fugitive 
law. To do that, while holding to the doctrines on which he 
was elected, would have been palpably inconsistent. In order, 
therefore, to make a show of consistency, he must first repudi- 
ate this important doctrine of his party. As to the morality of 
this deception, I forbear to make any remarks. 

The boldness with which the President avows his friendship 
to the fugitive law, is not only commendable, but should entitle 
him to the thanks of the whole North as well as of the whole 
South. 

When the vote was taken upon that bill, there was found 
north of Mason and Dixon's line only three whigs in this body 
who possessed the moral courage to meet the odium of voting 
for its passage. From the day of that vote until the reading of 
this message, the whig press of the North, with nearly unani- 
mous voice, repeated and reiterated this fact, in order to exon- 

36 



422 ANNUAL MESSAGE OF THE PRESIDENT. 

erate their party from the odium of that measure, and to place 
the responsibility of its enactments upon their political oppo- 
nents. The message meets and exposes this unmanly subter- 
fuge, and boldly defies the odium attached to this measure. A 
short time will determine how many northern whigs will now 
face about at the bidding of the Executive, and share with him 
the unenviable fame of sustaining and continuing an enactment 
which is a libel upon all that is called law. These changes, Sir, 
may prove inconvenient to the younger members of the party, — 
to those who have had but little experience ; but to those who 
have been accustomed to follow the leaders of that party, these 
political somersets must have become familiar. 

Most of our whig editors of the North have assured their 
readers that the feelings and conscience and judgment of the 
President were opposed to this fugitive law. This message 
will teach them that he thinks his own thoughts, and speaks 
his own wishes, and acts upon his own judgment ; and that it is 
for them to turn round and swallow their words, and go in for 
a continuance of this law which they have so loudly denounced, 
or they will be read out of the party. 

Sir, had the President avowed his desire for the passage of 
this law, prior to his election in 1848, how many votes, think 
you, he would have received in the free States ? I imagine 
they would have been few. At that time he was represented 
as a friend of freedom, a supporter of northern rights, and 
devoted to the cause of humanity. Upon these principles he 
was sustained in the North. But no sooner were the clods 
adjusted upon the grave of his predecessor, than we were 
informed that he had abandoned every doctrine in relation to 
slavery which his party had maintained pending his election. 
He adopted the entire programme of measures announced in 
the Senate by the present Secretary of State on the 7th of 
March last. His influence was exerted for the delivery of 
some fifty thousand square miles of free territory to Texas and 
to slavery, — to pay Texas ten millions dollars, to hire her to 
abstain from driving the army from our western territory, and 
from dissolving the Union. He was in favor of the passage of 






ANNUAL MESSAGE OF THE PRESIDENT. 423 

laws to organize governments in our territories, without exclud- 
ing slavery ; and he was in favor of this fugitive law. 

No man had ever come into the Presidential chair, who so 
unceremoniously cast aside and repudiated the important 
pledges of his friends and his party. No public man of high 
standing, from the free States, has so suddenly and so boldly 
abjured the cause of freedom, and, before the world, pledged 
fealty to the slave power, saving and excepting his Secretary 
of State, whose counsels he appears to have adopted. 

But this boldness, this manly frankness with which the Pres- 
ident announces his change of position, and tacitly calls upon 
his former friends to follow him, may teach us the propriety of 
hereafter understanding the principles of our presidential can- 
didates before we vote for them, rather than undergo the mor- 
tification of those party changes and countermarchings. The 
public will watch with much interest to see how many of his 
party friends will change their position, in order to stand with 
him in favor of this fugitive law and of slavery. 

The President informs us that the Constitution has made it 
his duty to " take care that the laws be faithfully executed." 
All are aware that such is made his duty. But how has he 
performed it ? He has seen the mails violated in South Caro- 
lina and other States, robbed of newspapers which do not 
suit the taste of their people, and the laws of Congress held in 
contempt and trampled upon. This is done by his own officers, 
who hold their appointments at his will ; but, Sir, has he ousted 
such men from office ? Y^e have yet to learn that he has even 
reproved them, much less has he hinted at these things in this 
message. He sees the free colored citizens of New England* 
and, indeed, of nearly all the free States, seized, imprisoned, 
and sold into bondage by southern men. He is aware that 
hundreds, and, perhaps, thousands of free bom northern citi- 
zens now pine in southern chains ; he witnesses this transcend- 
ent outrage upon the laws, upon the Constitution, and upon 
humanity, in perfect silence ; he does not even hint at their 
existence. He has seen the agents of Massachusetts driven by 
mob violence from South Carolina and Louisiana, when sent 



424 ANNUAL MESSAGE OF THE PRESIDENT. 

there to sustain the legal rights of the citizens of that State now 
held in slavery. He knew that no northern State nor individ- 
ual could rescue those citizens from the chains of servitude. 
Upon outrages more aggravated than any that have ever 
occurred under this government, he makes no comment. 

Sir, the House and the country must see that the only sym- 
pathy exhibited in the message is for slavery ; he has none for 
freedom. He recommends us not to repeal the fugitive law, 
but recommends no law to sustain the liberties of our own peo- 
ple, or to redeem those freemen who mourn in southern bond- 
age ; still he assures us that, " in our domestic policy, the Con- 
stitution shall be his guide," and that " he regards all its provi- 
sions as equally binding." That this declaration is entirely 
erroneous, is too obvious to require further exposure. 

Mr. Chairman, our opposition to the fugitive law is based 
upon the soundest principles of ethics and of law, as well as the 
dictates of the common sense of mankind. "While the southern 
men are thus seizing northern freemen, enslaving and brutalizing 
them, they turn round and call on us to leave our employments, 
give chase, arrest, and return their fugitive slaves. While vio- 
lating our national compact in its most vital features, they ask 
us not merely to observe and keep our stipulations, but to go 
far beyond our covenants to uphold their slavery. 

Now, Sir, these southern men have no claim whatever on us 
to observe the compact, while they disregard and trample upon 
it. Such are the dictates of law, and of justice, and the teach- 
ings of common sense. A compliance with such demand would 
constitute us the mere subsidiaries, the appendages of southern 
slavery. This feeling has thus far been suppressed by our 
intelligent people, hoping that Congress would relieve them 
from the position in which they have long been placed. If this 
fugitive law be kept in force, and Congress shall exert its 
power and influence to degrade our people, I, Sir, will not pre- 
dict the consequences. They may be read in our past history. 
One thing may be regarded as admitted truth, — while north- 
ern freemen are held in southern chains, the people of 
the free States will not arrest, nor return fugitive slaves. I 



ANNUAL MESSAGE OF THE PRESIDENT. 425 

speak for no other portion of the country. But the South and 
the North, the East and the West, may understand, that, while 
the inhabitants of our State shall be held in slavery, (and 
there are many there,) few, very few, slaves will return to 
bondage from that section of country where I reside. 

Sir, suppose a man born among us, educated in our schools, 
baptized in our churches, professing our religion, but who has 
been seized and held in southern slavery, should make his 
escape, and revisit the scenes of his birth and childhood ; but, 
while quietly and peaceably among us, the baying of human 
bloodhounds should be heard upon his track, and the whole 
army of slave-catchers, including certain high dignitaries who 
procured the passage of the fugitive law, should be seen com- 
ing in hot pursuit, with handcuffs and chains and fetters pre- 
pared and clanking in their hands; do you, Sir, think they 
would take him, and fetter him, in the presence of our people, 
and drag him back to a land of sighs and tears ? Sir, if the 
President, or members of this body, or that class of clergymen 
who are preaching that obedience to this law is a religious 
duty, believe this can be done, they had better study the char- 
acter of our population more thoroughly. 

Under that law, such cases may frequently occur; and 
whether there be a neighborhood north of Mason and Dixon's 
line, where such a freemen can be taken back to a land of 
whips and chains, I leave for others to judge ; I will not argue 
the point. 

But the President is not satisfied with quoting the words of 
the Constitution ; he closes the paragraph with the following 
sentence : 

" You o-entlemen, and &o country, may be assured, that to the utmost of. 
my ability, and to the extent of the power vested in me, I shall at all times, 
and in all places, take care that the laws be faithfully executed." 

This language is understood by the House and by the coun- 
try. No one can mistake its import. It is the language of 
menace, — of intimidation. He distinctly avows that, "to the 
extent of the power vested in him, he will see " this infamous law 
executed. The power of the army and the navy is vested ini 
36* 



426 ANNUAL MESSAGE OF THE PRESIDENT. 

the President. This power he assures us, will be used to shoot 
down northern freemen, if necessary to enforce this law. This 
attempt at menace is unworthy of the President. It is unbe- 
coming his station. I feel pained while contemplating the posi- 
tion in which the President has thus placed himself. No lan- 
guage could have been more destructive to his influence. This 
taunting menace should never have been addressed to freemen ; 
to men who understand the Constitution, and know their rights. 
I have shown some reasons why our people of northern Ohio 
will not obey that law. The President may speak to them of 
the "power vested in him ; " of the army and navy ; and he 
may tell them that he will use the whole military power of the 
nation at all times, and in all places, to enforce this detestable 
law ; but, Sir, they will hurl back defiance both at him and his 
army. He may send his troops, — his Swiss guards of sla- 
very ; he may put all the machines of human butchery in ope- 
ration ; he may drench our free land with blood ; he may enti- 
tle himself to the appellation of a second " Haynau ; " but he 
will never compel them to obey that law. They will govern 
themselves ; they will obey every constitutional enactment ; 
but they will discard and repudiate this fugitive bill. I speak 
what I feel before God and man. I speak what every enlight- 
ened statesman must feel and admit, when I say that no free, 
enlightened, and independent people ever was, or ever will be, 
governed by the bayonet and the sword. No, Sir. I will say 
to the President with all kindness, but with unhesitating confi- 
dence, our people will never be compelled by the bayonet or 
the cannon, or in any other manner, to lend any aid or assist- 
ance in executing that infamous law : nor will they obey it. 

The President should have learned ere this, that public sen- 
timent, with an enlightened and patriotic people, is stronger 
than armies or navies ; that he himself is but the creature of 
the people's will, — their servant, — elected to execute their 
purposes. In the enactment of this law, their feelings were 
not consulted, their honor was disregarded, and their wishes 
were treated with scorn. Sir, a large portion of the northern 
people were not represented in this body at the passage of that 



ANNUAL MESSAGE OP THE PRESIDENT. 427 

law. Their servants fled from this hall, and left the interests, 
the rights, and the honor of their constituents to be disposed of 
by slave-holders and their obsequious allies. This law " was 
conceived in sin," and literally " brought forth in iniquity." It 
is due to our southern friends that we should inform them dis- 
tinctly that the law cannot and will not be enforced. Our peo- 
ple, Sir, know what constitutes law. This enactment I call a 
law merely for convenience, because our language furnishes 
no proper term in which to characterize it. It has the form, 
but is entirely destitute of the spirit, — the essence of law. It 
commands the perpetration of crimes, which no human enact- 
ment can justify. In passing it, Congress overstepped the 
limits of civil government, and attempted to usurp powers 
which belong only to God. In this attempt to involve our peo- 
ple in crimes forbidden by inspiration, by every impulse of 
humanity, and to command one portion of the people to wage a 
war upon another, Congress was guilty of tyranny unexam- 
pled. 

This enactment is beyond the power, outside the duties of 
human government; it imposes no obligation to commit the 
crimes it commands, it can justify no one for committing them. 
For this reason, the people will not obey it. Nor is this doc- 
trine new, either in theory or in practice. In every State of 
the Union, statutes have been enacted which never have been, 
and never could be enforced. They are so opposed to the pub- 
lic sense of justice and propriety, that they remain a dead let- 
ter from the day of their enactment. Congress has enacted 
many such laws, which no President ever could or ever will 
enforce. This fugitive law must be repealed, or, if it remain 
unrepealed, it will remain a dead letter. Of the fifteen thou- 
sand fugitives in the free States, probably not ten have been 
returned to bondage, and I doubt whether ten more will be re- 
turned under it. 

When Mr. Jefferson came into power, he found men impris- 
oned under the sedition law, which he deemed unconstitutional. 
He did not hesitate to pardon them. They had been deprived 
of their liberty without constitutional authority. But Mr. 



428 ANNUAL MESSAGE OF THE PRESIDENT. 

Fillmore pledges himself to exert his power to punish every 
man who assists his fellow man to regain his liberty. Such, 
Sir, is the difference between Mr. Jefferson and Mr. Fillmore. 
Mr. Chairman, I now wish to call the attention of the House 
to the assertion of an important principle, in which I most 
heartily concur. The President says : 

" Every citizen who truly loves the Constitution, and desires the continuance 
of its existence and its blessings, will resolutely and firmly resist any inter- 
ference in those domestic affairs, which the Constitution has clearly and une- 
quivocally left to the exclusive authority of the States." 

And why did the President seek to interfere with slavery ? 
Why not let the slave States take care of their own institu- 
tions ? Why did he urge the passage of this fugitive law ? 
Why attempt to make the people of the free States interfere to 
catch southern negroes ? Why prostitute his official power and 
the power of the government to such degrading purposes ? 

If there be any one feature of the Constitution, which the 
whole history of its adoption has made plain, it is that slavery 
is a State institution, over which Congress has no control, — 
with which this Federal Government has no legitimate powers 
to interfere. We, Sir, of the North, will not be constrained, 
even by your fugitive law, to interfere with it. The slavery of 
Virginia belongs to her. If she possess the power and the dis- 
position to uphold it, we cannot put it down or abolish it. If 
she sees fit to abolish it, we have no power to interfere to sus- 
tain it. 

I have often defined the views of anti-slavery men, and of free 
soilers, on this subject ; others have often done it ; yet we are 
misapprehended and constantly misrepresented. That clause of 
the message now under consideration, was intended to impute 
to us a purpose, a desire, to interfere with southern slavery. 
That idea, false and unfounded, has been asserted and reiterated 
for years. The President should have been better informed. 
For the hundredth time I repeat, that Congress, nor this Fed- 
eral Government, have any more power to interfere with the 
slavery of the southern States than they have with the serf- 
dom of Russia. The slave States hold their "peculiar institu- 



ANNUAL MESSAGE OF THE PRESIDENT. 429 

tion " as independently of this government, as Russia holds her 
serfs. Again, Sir, this government possesses no more right to 
involve the people of the North in the support of southern sla- 
very, than it has to involve us in the support of Russian serf- 
dom. Congress possesses no more power nor right to make us 
the catchers of southern slaves, than of Russian serfs. 

These were the views and feelings of those who framed the 
Constitution. They never dreamed of making us the catch- 
poles for southern slave-hunters. 

In the Convention which framed the Constitution, Governeur 
Morris said that " he never would concur in upholding domes- 
tic slavery." So say I, and so say our people of the North. 
We never will concur in upholding that institution. Mr. Mor- 
ris added, " it is a nefarious institution. It was the curse of 
Heaven upon the States in which it existed." 

So we say. It is a curse upon those States ; but the curse 
is theirs, not ours, and we will not share in it. Your fugitive 
law shall not compel us to share in it. Our fathers would not 
consent to be involved in its crimes ; we will not. 

Mr. Gerry of Massachusetts said, " while we have nothing 
to do with slavery in the States, we should be careful to lend 
no sanction to it." Sir, we will lend no sanction to it, nor shall 
your fugitive law compel us to sanction it. Mr. Dickinson 
" thought it a proper subject for the general government to 
interfere with, as it affected our national happiness." But 
southern members resisted this proposition. They would give 
to the Federal Government no powers to interfere with slavery 
for any purpose. 

But I desire to come more directly to the clause relating to 
fugitive slaves. When the committee reported the draft of a 
Constitution, it contained the clause for the arrest and return of 
fugitives from justice, as it now stands. They were to be deliv- 
ered up by the Executive of the State to which they should flee ; 
and this was to be done, also, at the expense of such State. 
While this report was under consideration, Messrs. Butler and 
Pinckney of South Carolina moved to amend it, so as to " re- 



430 ANNUAL MESSAGE OF THE PRESIDENT. 

quire fugitives, slaves, and servants to be delivered up like 
criminals." 

Mr. Wilson of Pennsylvania said, " this would oblige the 
Executive to do it at the public expense." 

Mr. Sherman of Connecticut " saw no more propriety in the 
public seizing and surrendering a fugitive slave or servant, than 
a horse" And on these suggestions, Mr. Butler withdrew his 
proposition. These facts were recorded by Mr. Madison ; and 
no stronger evidence could have been left of the intention of 
the framers of the Constitution to save the freemen of the 
North from all expense, and guilt, and disgrace, of arresting 
fugitive slaves. The clause for the return of fugitive slaves, 
as it now stands, was subsequently adopted, with the concur- 
rence of Mr. Wilson and of Mr. Sherman. It provides that 
the State to which the slave flees shall not, by any law or 
regulation, release him from labor. " Non-interference " be- 
tween the master and slave, was their intention, their ulterior 
design. The last member of the sentence says of the slave, he 
" shall be delivered up on claim of the person to whom such 
service or labor may be due." 

This language has been understood by some as rendering 
action necessary on the part of the people of the State to which 
the slave may have fled. This construction is opposed to the 
whole spirit of the Constitution. Every reader will see at 
once that such obligation is not imposed upon the Governor, 
nor upon the people of the State, nor upon any individual. 
The Supreme Court has given a construction to this language 
which is in accordance with the intention and object of the 
framers of the Constitution. We are to deliver up the fugitive 
slave, as we deliver up our friends to the civil officer. We are 
bound to permit the master to arrest and carry back the slave, 
in the same manner that we permit the civil officer to seize our 
friends, under process, and take them to prison. 

And such was the law of 1793. It followed the Constitution. 
It saved the master from interruption, while pursuing his slave. 
It provided fines and penalties against any person who, diso- 



ANNUAL MESSAGE OF THE PRESIDENT. 431 

beying the constitutional compact, should secrete or defend or 
rescue the slave. There the law of 1793 stopped. It went no 
farther. It gave the master no process under the seal of your 
courts, by which to arrest his slave. It commanded no officer 
of this government to aid the master in making such arrest. 
No powers of this government were prostituted to such degrad- 
ing purposes. " Non-interference " between the master and 
slave was the rule by which that whole law was framed. And 
it is to the honor of the Supreme Court that, in their construc- 
tion of the Constitution and of the law, they have carried out 
this view. They have adopted the very idea of Mr. Wilson 
and Mr. Sherman. They declare the right of the master to 
recapture his slave to be the same as his right to take his prop- 
erty which strays into a free State. They construe our duties 
to deliver up the fugitive slave, to be the same as to deliver up 
the stray horse. If the horse or the slave come among us, 
we permit the owner or master to take him. But in neither 
case can the owner or master call on us to catch the slave or 
the horse. 

Neither the law of 1793, nor the Constitution, contemplated 
the organization of northern freemen into a constabulary force 
for catching negroes. Nor did it give the master a guard and 
assistance to carry back his slave at the expense of the nation. 
Such provisions could never have been approved by Washing- 
ton, who signed the law of 1793, nor by his associates who had 
aided in framing the Constitution, and who also voted for that 
law. They understood their constitutional duties. 

The extent of our powers consists in prohibiting the people 
from interfering between the master and slave. And this fugi- 
tive law is unconstitutional to the full extent to which it at- 
tempts to exert its powers in aid of slavery. The appointment 
of officers, making it their duty to issue process, to pursue the 
slave, to arrest, to carry him back, and the paying expenses 
from the treasury, are all unconstitutional acts. They, Sir, 
interfere with slavery, and are repugnant to the whole spirit of 
the Constitution. The President, in the quotation I have made, 



432 ANNUAL MESSAGE OF THE PRESIDENT. 

unintentionally condemns these acts. I condemn them, the 
country condemns them, humanity condemns them. 

All who read this message must see that the only interfe- 
rence with slavery which the President professes to deprecate, 
is that which tends to loosen the chains of bondage ; he appears 
to have no objection to that interference which rivets them 
closer. Could he have believed that the intelligent freemen of 
the North would fail to detect the palpable contradiction be- 
tween that portion of the message which deprecates interference 
with slavery, and that which urges the continuance of this law, 
which was enacted for the very purpose of interfering in sup- 
port of that institution ? 

Could any interference have been more direct and palpable 
than that which makes it the duty of the deputy-marshal or 
commissioner, under a heavy penalty, to exert his utmost pow- 
ers to arrest the fugitive ? Which gives him authority to call 
the whole power of the State to assist him ? Which " commands 
all good citizens to aid and assist in the prompt " arrest and 
return of the trembling slave ? This interference the Presi- 
dent approves. It rivets tighter the chains of bondage, while 
we are all aware that he disapproved our efforts to exclude 
slavery from the free territory of New Mexico. 

But this law goes farther ; it not only attempts to strike 
down God's law, which commands us " to feed the hungry," but 
it attempts to convert every freeman of the North into a savage. 
If a fugitive from oppression reaches my door amid the ragings 
of the storm, half clad, and benumbed with cold, fainting and 
weary, sick and in distress, and asks to warm himself by my 
fire, this law interferes, and forbids me, under heavy pains and 
penalties, to comply with his request. If I obey the law, I 
must drive him from my door, to perish with hunger and cold. 
If I receive him to my habitation, warm him by my fire, — if I 
feed him, and give him drink, and restore him, so that he pur- 
sues his journey and escapes, I am subjected, under this law, to 
a fine of one thousand dollars and to six months' imprisonment. 
This law the President approves, and advises us to continue it 



ANNUAL MESSAGE OF THE PRESIDENT. 433 

in force. This practice he sustains, and asks us to uphold. I 
reply, in his own language : " Every citizen who truly loves 
the Constitution, will resolutely and firmly resist " the inter- 
ference which this law enjoins. 

Sir, our people will continue to feed the hungry, to clothe 
the naked, to visit the sick, and to relieve the oppressed ; and 
no interference of this fugitive law will prevent this compli- 
ance with the dictates of our religion, with that law which 
came from God himself, and which no enactment of slave- 
holders and doughfaces can repeal or nullify. I speak for no 
one but myself and constituents ; others will choose whether to 
obey God or the oppressors of mankind ; but as for us, we 
will obey that higher law of kindness, benevolence, and human- 
ity, which was implanted in the breast of every human being, 
and written upon the hearts and consciences of mankind, by 
the finger of our Creator. 

Mr. Chairman, the doctrine of " non-interference with sla- 
very," laid down by the President, is at war with every pro- 
vision of this fugitive law. If we maintain that doctrine, this 
law must remain a dead letter upon our statute book. He who 
sustains this doctrine must disobey the law ; for the Constitu- 
tion and this law are antagonisms — at war with each other. If 
we adhere to one, we must discard the other. My constituents 
will maintain the Constitution, while they will hold this law in 
contempt. Sir, from the adoption of the Constitution until 
1841, never was this doctrine of " non-interference between 
master and slave " denied by the Executive. At that time, 
the present Secretary of State, in a correspondence with our 
Minister at London, substantially avowed it to be the duty of 
this government to protect southern slave-dealers while pursu- 
ing their vocation. This doctrine, coming from a Massachu- 
setts man, inspired his successor (Mr. Upshur) to maintain the 
same principles, while advocating the annexation of Texas in 
1843. Up to 1841,1 repeat, that "non-interference between 
master and slave " was the doctrine of the North and of the 
South, of whigs and of democrats. 

It is true that our slave-holding Presidents at times lent their 
37 



434 ANNUAL MESSAGE OF THE PRESIDENT. 

powers silently to uphold slavery ; but no officer of govern- 
ment ever avowed it to be the duty of Congress, or the Execu- 
tive, thus to interfere, until the present Secretary of State put 
forth that construction in 1841. I repeat that, from the day of 
adopting the Constitution until 1841, the doctrine of " non-inter- 
ference with slavery in the States " was never denied, to my 
knowledge, by any public man of this nation ; and no member 
of this body ever attempted to overthrow it by argument, until 
the last session of Congress. To the gentleman from Georgia, 
(Mr. Toombs,) not now in his seat, belongs the honor of being 
the member of this House who boldly and publicly demanded 
that the powers and energies of this government should be 
prostituted to the support of slavery. The President and his 
Cabinet may adopt this new theory — but the people of the 
North will repudiate it. 

The message further says, " the law is the only sure protec- 
tion of the weak, and the only efficient restraint upon the strong." 
This, Sir, is said with direct reference to this fugitive slave 
law, to induce the people to execute it. It would seem that the 
President intended to see how far he could impose upon the 
intelligence of the public. Sir, what protection does this law 
lend to the poor, weak, oppressed, degraded slave, whose flesh 
has often quivered under the lash of his inhuman owner, 
whose youth has been spent in labor for another, whose intellect 
has been nearly blotted out ? When he seeks an asylum in a 
land of freedom, this worse than barbarous law sends the 
officers of government to chase him down-— to carry him back 
to chains and suffering. The people are constrained to become 
his pursuers. Famishing and fainting, he drags his weary 
limbs forward, while the whole power of the government under 
the President's command, the army and navy, and all the free- 
.men of the land, are on his track, to scourge him back to 
bondage. And this law, the President tells us, is the only sure 
/protection to that miserable slave. Does the President intend 
to insult our intelligence ? Or did he mean to insert in this 
grave document a satire upon this barbarous enactment ? 

Sir, there is not a man in this body, there is not an intelli- 



ANNUAL MESSAGE OF THE PRESIDENT. 435 

gent man in the free States but knows, if he delivers a fugi- 
tive into the custody of his pursuers, that he will be carried 
back and sold to the far South ; and, ordinarily, his life will be 
sacrificed in five years, if employed on the sugar plantations, 
and in seven years on the cotton plantations. The men of the 
North look upon this as murder, and would almost as soon turn 
out and cut the throat of the defenceless negro as to send him 
back to be scourged to death. As soon would they do this as 
comply with a law which violates every principle of humanity, 
and consigns the fugitive to a lingering death by a slow torture 
of five or seven years. The common law holds him who aids 
in a murder, as guilty as he who strikes the knife to the heart 
of the victim. Under our law, a man is hanged, if he fails to 
prevent a murder, when it is plainly within his power to do so. 
Such a man is held guilty of the act, and he is hanged accord- 
ingly. 

And will any one suppose that he who assists in arresting 
and sending a fugitive slave to torture and death, will be less 
guilty than he under whose lash the victim expires ? 

Sir, I have compared this capture of a fugitive to a common 
murder. In doing that I do injustice to the common murderer. 
To capture a slave, and send him to the South to die under a 
torture of five years, is far more criminal than ordinary murder, 
inasmuch as it adds the guilt of torture to the crime of murder. 
Sir, we will not commit this crime. Let me say to the Pres- 
ident, no power of government can compel us to involve our- 
selves in such guilt. No ! The freemen of Ohio will never 
turn out to chase the panting fugitive ; they will never be met- 
amorphosed into bloodhounds, to track him to his hiding-place, 
and seize and drag him out, and deliver him to his tormentors. 
They may be shot down ; the cannon and bayonet and sword 
may do their work upon them ; they may drown the fugitives 
in the blood of freemen ; but never will freemen stoop to the 
degradation of catching slaves. 

Let no man tell me there is no higher law than this fugitive 
bill. "We feel there is a law of right, a law of justice, of free- 



436 ANNUAL MESSAGE OF THE PRESIDENT. 

dom, implanted in the breast of every intelligent human being, 
that bids him look with scorn upon this miscalled law. 

Sir, I was about to make some comparisons, but, perhaps, 
they may be regarded as indelicate. I, however, shall not hes- 
itate to speak truth. During last summer, two distinguished 
gentlemen of the same name occupied much of the public atten- 
tion. One was said to have committed murder, and the other 
to have procured the passage of this law. One was hanged for 
his crime ; the other, for his efforts, was taken to the Executive 
cabinet. One destroyed the life of an individual, the other con- 
tributed his influence for the passage of this law, which, if exe- 
cuted, must consign hundreds, perhaps thousands, to premature 
graves. I, Sir, cannot speak for others ; but, for myself, I 
would rather meet my final Judge with the guilt of him who 
has gone to his last account resting upon my soul, than that of 
him who sits in yonder Cabinet. Sir, do you, or does any one, 
conceive that it is less criminal to take the life of one of those 
fugitives than it would be to slay any other individual ? Is not 
he who gives his voice and influence from yonder Cabinet, for 
the murder of those people, as guilty as he would be to lend 
his voice and influence for the murder of others ? Shall men 
in high stations, from ambitious, from corrupt motives, lend 
themselves to the degradation, the destruction of hundreds, 
nay, thousands of human beings, and yet be shielded from ani- 
madversion by their political position ? Has it come to this, 
that place and power are to be regarded as exempting their 
occupants from moral guilt, from responsibility, both here and 
hereafter ? 

An idea appears to exist in some minds, that obedience to an 
act of Congress, however criminal that act may be, cannot 
involve the person who thus obeys the law in any moral guilt. 
In other words, they appear to think that, if under this fugitive 
law they drive the famishing slave from their doors to perish 
with cold and hunger, or if they seize him, place the fetters 
upon his limbs, and drag him to bondage to be massacred under 
the lash, to be murdered by slow torture, they will, when called 



ANNUAL MESSAGE OF THE PRESIDENT. 437 

to their final account, plead this enactment in bar of Omnipo- 
tent Justice. 

That kind of theology I leave to those teachers who preach 
sermons and write pamphlets and newspaper essays in defence 
of this law ; to those divines who hold that we, the members of 
Congress, possess the power to step between God and our fel- 
low creatures, and authorize them to disregard His command, 
and to commit crimes at which all the feelings of our nature 
revolt. Such teachings may have been received as orthodox in 
the ninth, but they will be rejected in the nineteenth century. 

Why, Sir, no man, not even the slave-holders, will deny to 
the fugitive the same natural and inalienable right to his liberty 
that either of us possess ; that it is his duty to maintain and 
defend that right whenever it shall be in his power to do so ; 
that it is his duty to escape if he can ; that if, while making his 
way to a land of freedom, the master interpose, and he has no 
other possible way of escape than to slay his master, he is 
bound by every obligation to himself and his offspring to resort 
to that extremity. He has no right tamely to surrender up the 
liberty with which God has endowed him, and to consign his 
offspring in all coming time to degrading servitude. Oxw peo- 
ple so advise the fugitives ; and the fugitives ar© generally 
armed, and prepared to receive their pursuers ; and I am 
informed that one of them, when hard pressed recently, shot 
one of those human bloodhounds dead, and wounded another, 
and then went on his way. Sir, we all feel that he did right ; 
that we would have done the same thing had we been in his sit- 
uation. 

Some months since there were said to be fifteen thousand 
fugitives from labor within the free States, including men,, 
women, and children ; many of them were born and educated; 
among us. These men, with their wives and their little ones 3 . 
were in the enjoyment of domestic life. Most of them hadi 
j acquired, or were in the way of obtaining, sufficient real and: 
personal property to insure them the necessaries, and event 
many of the luxuries of life. They were educating their chil- 
dren, and becoming intelligent and useful members of commu- 
37* 



438 ANNUAL MESSAGE OF THE PRESIDENT. 

nity. Many of them belonged to our various churches, and 
maintained an orderly and Christian deportment. 

Against these inoffensive people, the President and Congress 
have waged a barbarous and unrelenting war. We have re- 
quired our officers and the freemen of the North, when called 
on, to seize them; to drag them from their firesides, their 
homes, their friends, their schools and churches, their lands, 
and their flocks and herds ; to separate husbands and wives, 
parents and children, and consign them indiscriminately to all 
the horrors of slavery and of the slave-trade. I hesitate not to 
say, that, for its barbarity, that law is unequalled in the history 
of civilized legislation. Is there a reflecting man who will pre- 
tend that this barbarous enactment imposes upon those people 
any moral duty to obey it ? "Will preachers of righteousness 
tell them to submit, to let the slave-dealer rivet the chains upon 
the father, tear the mother from her children, and doom her to 
a life of wretchedness ? Will such preachers advise the daugh- 
ter peacefully to surrender herself into the hands of slave-hunt- 
ers, and submit to a life of pollution and shame ? And will 
such men be called promoters of holiness and purity ? I trust 
there are few such teachers in this American land. Sir, all 
good men must detest this law. God has no attribute which 
will permit him to look upon it, except with abhorrence. 

Yet the President assures us that it ought not to be repealed ; 
that it should be kept in force ; that these outrages should and 
ought to continue ; that he regards this law as a final settle- 
ment of the slave question ; and that it is wrong farther to agi- 
tate the subject. Vain advice. Agitation will never cease 
until the law ceases. While such crimes are authorized by 
statute, the American people will not keep silence. 

The President, referring to the bill surrendering to Texas 
and to slavery fifty thousand square miles of free territory, and 
paying her ten millions of dollars, and that allowing slavery to 
be extended over New Mexico and Utah, and to this fugitive 
law, says : 

"I believed those measures to have been necessary, and required by the cir- 
cumstances and condition of the country." 



ANNUAL MESSAGE OF THE PRESIDENT. 439 

I rejoice, Mr. Chairman, that he has boldly avowed this fact. 
Nearly the whole North believed that he was in heart and con- 
science opposed to this bill. Almost every whig press in the 
North said plainly, that the President did not favor this bill, 
but that he was coerced ; that he signed it by compulsion ; that 
it was the whig doctrine concerning the veto that compelled 
him to sign it. The President's views are now before the 
country, and he avows his position. He places himself upon 
this law ; and here I w r ish to say to the House, that we all 
know where the President is. He is in favor of continuing this 
law ; he not only places himself there, but his administration 
and his party must stand or fall by this law. I rejoice at it ! 
They must sink or swim, live or die, stand or fall, w r ith this 
enactment. 

There is no lingering doubt, no difficulty, no obscurity, rest- 
ing on the party which supports this administration. All the 
whigs throughout the country, (and I speak it with some degree 
of feeling, for I once had the pleasure of acting with them, when 
they had principles ; then we avowed and acted upon the doc- 
trines I have stated to-day) — all the whigs throughout the 
country must now feel that their unity is gone. They see that 
the party has departed from its doctrines and principles, and 
has descended, step by step, from its former position, until the 
remnant has literally become a slave-catching party. 

The President informs us that these measures " were adopted 
in a spirit of conciliation, and for the purpose of conciliation." 
" I believe," says he, " that a great majority of our fellow citi- 
zens sympathize in that spirit and that purpose, and in the 
main approve it." Sir, where does the President find this evi- 
dence of approval in the popular mind ? Does he draw his 
conclusions from the result ef the elections in Delaware, New 
Jersey, or Ohio ? 

That third State of the Union has separated itself forever 
from all men and all parties who would involve our people in 
the support of slavery, or degrade them by sustaining your fugi- 
tive law. Does the President find consolation in the voice of 
the " Peninsular State," as lately expressed through the ballot 



440 ANNUAL MESSAGE OF THE PRESIDENT. 

box ? Or can he take pleasure in referring to the election in 
Wisconsin, or when he examines the result of those measures 
in his own State ? Or has the demonstrations in Massachusetts 
inspired him with confidence that the popular mind is in favor 
of this law ? 

Methinks that as he looks over the newly made graves of 
his political friends, and counts their number, and reflects upon 
that political cholera which has cut down so many of his sup- 
porters and advocates of this law, he might have doubted its 
popularity. Many gentlemen in this hall, who so boldly stood 
forth in the pride of their political manhood a few months since, 
and voted for these measures, are now doomed to a speedy 
departure, and the places that now know them shall know them 
(politically) no more. To those gentlemen, the language of the 
President can bring but poor consolation. 

The public meetings of the people of all parties throughout 
the free States, the spirited resolutions which they have sent 
forth, are but feeble manifestations of the popular mind. 
Throughout the North, where free schools have been encour- 
aged, where newspapers circulate, and intelligence is dissemi- 
nated, there public sentiment is loud in condemnation of this 
law. This feeling is increasing and extending, and rolling for- 
ward, and gaining strength and impetus, and will continue to do 
so, until that law shall be repealed, and numbered among the 
things that were. 

Sir, if the President will look at the statute lately enacted 
by the whigs of Vermont, he will be able clearly to read the 
" handwriting upon the wall." The people have weighed this 
law in the balance, and it is found wanting. 

Near the close of his message the President says : 

" I cannot doubt that the American people, bound together by kindred blood 
and common traditions, still cherish a paramount regard for the Union of their 
fathers ; and that they are ready to rebuke any attempt to violate its integrity, 
to disturb the compromises on which it is based, or to resist the laws which 
have been enacted under its authority." 

As to the " Union of our fathers" I venerate it. There is 
something pleasing and solemn in the recollection of that 



ANNUAL MESSAGE OF THE PRESIDENT. 441 

Union, — in the history of its formation, and the difficulties 
and dangers which surrounded it. But it is now nearly half a 
century since that Union ceased to exist. The prospect of 
commercial advantages induced us to abandon it, and form a 
new one with Louisiana. Then, Sir, we again abandoned it, 
and took Florida to our embrace. Then, to extend and per- 
petuate slavery, we abandoned that Union, and brought in 
slave-holding Texas, assuming her war, and carrying devasta- 
tion, rapine, and bloodshed to the heart of Mexico. And, to 
cap the climax, you have passed this fugitive law, and made the 
citizens of Ohio, and of all the free States, the catchpolls to 
Texian slave-hunters. 

It is not to be disguised, that the people of the free States 
feel less attachment to Texas than they did to the old thirteen 
States. We are not bound to them by common traditions. 
The Mexicans, and Spaniards, and other foreigners of that 
State, shared not in the toils nor the dangers of our revolution, 
nor in those of our second war of Independence. The arro- 
gant and supercilious manner in which Texas threatened to 
drive our army from New Mexico, and to dissolve the Union, 
has not served to strengthen the cords of affection which 
should have bound us together. 

But neither the President, nor any other person, will charge 
the North with disloyalty to the Union. But that portion of 
the sentence just quoted, which refers to the " attempts to dis- 
turb its compromises," was intended to refer to those politi- 
cal friends with whom I act. 

Sir, those compromises referred to by the President, left us 
entirely free from the support of slavery. By the passage of 
this fugitive law, those compromises have been disturbed, and 
the people of the North involved in the degradation and guilt 
of sustaining slavery ; and, Sir, in the language of the Presi- 
dent, " they are ready to rebuke " those who have thus dis- 
turbed the compromises, — and they will rebuke them. Our 
people, too, will resist, by every constitutional means, the exe- 
cution of that law. 

This practice of attempting to sanctify every enormity in 



442 ANNUAL MESSAGE OF THE PRESIDENT. 

legislation by referring to the " Union of our fathers" has be- 
come very common among a certain class of politicians ; but I 
did not expect to meet with it in the message of the President. 
It does not comport with the dignity of such a paper. It is 
almost as much out of place as it would be to appeal to the 
loyalty which our fathers anciently bore to the British crown. 
The Union of our fathers was adopted as the best means of 
preserving the liberties, and promoting the happiness of the 
people. It was abandoned for the same purpose. Even our 
Union with Texas was framed for that avowed object. A 
majority of Congress thought and believed that it would 
increase the wealth and the happiness of the people. For the 
same purpose we waged a war with Mexico, and conquered 
another vast territory, and brought another State into the 
Union. The Union now existing will be retained so long as 
the great mass of the people shall regard it as conducive to 
their interests and happiness. Yet, whenever they shall be 
convinced that it subserves the cause of oppression, that it has 
become an instrument for degrading themselves, another revo- 
lution will take place, and they will lay it aside, as our fathers 
did their union with England. They feel as the patriots of 
that day felt, that " whenever any form of government shall 
fail to sustain the self-evident truth that all men ivere created 
equal, and are entitled to the enjoyment of life and liberty" it is 
the right of the people to lay it aside, and to " adopt a new 
form of government, basing its action upon such principles as 
shall best promote their interests and happiness." 

But this cry of " danger to the Union " is becoming under- 
stood by the people. "To save the Union," we annexed 
Texas ; " to save the Union," we paid her ten millions of dol- 
lars ; " to save the Union," fifty thousand square miles of ter- 
ritory which had been consecrated to freedom by Mexico, and 
conquered by our arms, were delivered over to Texas and to 
slavery ; " to save the Union," the people of the free States 
have been compelled to become slave-catchers ; and we are 
now told that, "to save the Union," this infamous law must be 
kept in force ; " to save the Union," we must drive the famish- 



ANNUAL MESSAGE OF THE PRESIDENT. 443 

ing, weary fugitive from our doors, or seize him and send him 
back to his prisonhouse of bondage. 

Sir, it has come to this : the cry of " danger to the Union " 
is now resorted to, for the purpose of justifying every outrage 
upon the people of the North, which the slave power demands. 
Under this cry, meetings are called in your commercial cities, 
and resolutions adopted to " suppress agitation among the peo- 
ple" And the Secretary of State and distinguished Senators, 
write letters "to save the Union." Dinners are eaten, and 
wine drunk, and speeches made, " to save the Union." For the 
same purpose, the Secretary of State votes against the candi- 
date of his own party, and a distinguished Senator from a 
western State threatens to leave the whigs, with whom he has 
acted from early life. 

Sir, this clause of the message has reference to that new 
party which is already in process of formation, and which is 
to be based upon the doctrines of this message, — upon the 
policy of continuing in force this fugitive law, — the laws that 
sustain the slave-trade upon our southern coast and in this dis- 
trict, — and of opposing all efforts to exclude slavery from our 
territories, and from the District of Columbia. In short, Sir, 
this new party is to oppose all attempts to separate the people 
of the free States and this government from the support of that 
institution. 

I, Sir, rejoice at the prospect of seeing every public man, 

and every elector of the nation, take his position either for 

freedom or for slavery. The President has come out boldly 

and manfully on the side of oppression, in favor of compelling 

the. people of the North to become the catchers of southern 

slaves. He calls on his friends to take position with him. 

They will do so. We shall soon have but two political parties. 

One will contend for the emancipation of the free States and 

this government from the control of the slave power; to 

] restore vitality to the Constitution ; to give that instrument 

I effect ; to maintain the rights of all the States under it ; to se- 

i cure all men under our exclusive jurisdiction in the enjoyment 

! of life, liberty, and happiness. With Mr. Morris, and those 



444 ANNUAL MESSAGE OF THE PRESIDENT. 

who assisted in framing the Constitution, that party " never will 
concur in upholding domestic slavery." With Mr. Gerry, 
" while they have nothing to do with it in the States, they will 
lend no sanction to it." With Mr. Sherman, they " can see no 
more propriety in seizing and surrendering a fugitive slave than 
a horse." 

With these framers of the Constitution, the party of free- 
dom will stand. These principles they will maintain and carry 
out; they will separate and purify themselves from the sin and 
the shame of slavery ; they will redeem this government from 
its support ; they will leave it within the States where it exists. 
The judgment and conscience of the people are with us ; they 
know our doctrines to be correct. The popular heart beats for 
freedom. Party prejudices are giving way. Truth is doing its 
legitimate work. A great political revolution is going forward. 
No partizan influence can stay its progress. The history of the 
last few months and years, must bear to every reflecting mind, 
a consciousness that the principles of justice, of righteousness, 
of humanity must triumph. The moral sentiment of the 
nation demands the repeal of those acts of Congress which 
authorize and enjoin the commission of crimes. They will be 
repealed, and the government will be redeemed from its present 
position ; and its laws and influence will be exerted for the 
benefit, for the elevation of man. 



AGITATION OF THE SLAVE QUESTION.' 



BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE NEGLECTED UNDER PRETENCE OF AVOIDING AGI- ** 

TATION — AGITATION PRECIPITATED UPON THAT BODY AT IMPROPER 
PERIODS — AGITATION BY THE SECRETARY OF STATE AND HIS FRIENDS 

— THE PRESIDENTS PROCLAMATION — HIS POWERS DEFINED — HIS AU- 
THORITY OVER THE HOUSE DENIED — INDEPENDENCE OF REPRESENTA- 
TIVES VINDICATED — INDELICACY OF MR. CLAY EXPOSED — HIS DICTA- 
TION SPURNED — HIS ATTACK UPON THE NEGROES OF BOSTON REPROVED 

— THEIR RIGHTS DEFENDED — MR. CLAY'S ASSAULT UPON MR. THOMPSON 
CONDEMNED — ATTACKS OF MEMBERS UPON MR. ALLEN MET, AND INVES- 
TIGATION CHALLENGED. 

[Our treaty of peace with Mexico, bound the United States to pay to that 
government fifteen millions dollars, in four instalments- One of them became 
due in May, 1852. The transmission of nearly four millions dollars to Mexico, 
was regarded as a matter of great speculation, as bills on the United States are 
usually sold in the city of Mexico for about twelve per cent, premium. Different 
bankers therefore were desirous of obtaining the control Mr. Clayton, Secre- 
tary of State under General Taylor, refused to make arrangements for trans- 
mitting these funds, as he regarded it the appropriate duty of the Secretary of 
the Treasury. General Taylor died in July, and soon after Mr. Fillmore 
assumed the duties of President. His Secretary of State, Mr. Webster, imme- 
diately on entering upon Ms duties, made a contract with certain bankers in 
New York, Boston, and Washington, in connection with the Barings of Eng- 
land, to pay this money to the Mexican government, without giving notice of 
such intention, although the Rothschilds and other bankers were desirous of 
competing for the contract, and notwithstanding nearly two years were to 
elapse before the money would become due. On the 25th February, 1851, 
a bill came up for consideration in the House of Representatives, making 
appropriation of the money to pay this instalment, and directing the Secretary 
of State to make the proper arrangements for paying it to the Mexican gov- 

* Speech on the bill making appropriations for the Army. Delivered in 
Committee of the whole House on the state of the Union, February 26, 1851. 
38 



446 AGITATION OF THE SLAVE QUESTION. 

ernment. Mr. Allen, of Massachusetts, objected to imposing that duty upon 
the Secretary of State, who he thought was too much indebted to the bankers 
and brokers of Wall street, New York, and of State street, Boston, to perform 
this duty without bringing upon himself suspicions of pecuniary obligation 
and favoritism. He stated that he had good reason to believe the Secretary of 
State had received forty-five thousand dollars, raised by voluntary subscrip- 
tion, at the very time of making the arrangement to which allusion has been 
made. That he understood this amount was raised as a fund to compensate 
Mr. Webster for going into the office of Secretary of State. He stated his 
desire to bring before the House the evidence that would establish these facts, 
and demanded the appointment of a committee for that purpose. 

This proposition called forth an excited debate, which continued through 
that evening, and a portion of the next day. The friends of Mr. Webster 
assailed Mr. Allen with great bitterness, and extended their assaults to his 
political friends. The bill was passed, however, and the army bill was taken 
up. But these attacks upon the free democracy continued, and late in the 
evening of the 26th, Mr. Levin, of Pennsylvania, not only assailed the free 
democracy generally, but Mr. Giddings in particular. Up to that time, no free 
democrat, except Mr. Allen, had spoken. But this speech of Mr. Levin called 
from Mr, Giddings the following answer,] 

Mr. Chairman, — Last evening a proposition was before 
.us, directing the Secretary of State to make arrangements for 
-transmitting to Mexico the money soon to become due from us 
is that government. The amount was great, and would enable 
the Secretary to give fortunes to his friends, by preferring them 
to other bankers who were anxious to do the business. My 
friend from Massachusetts (Mr. Allen) was opposed to placing 
this money in the Lands of the Secretary of State, and frankly 
stated his objections. This gave offence to certain friends of 
that officer. They bitterly assailed the gentleman who thus 
spoke his honest convictions; these assaults were continued 
through the evening of yesterday, and during the most of this 
day. 

During the present evening, these assaults have been ex- 
tended to my humble self, and to all opponents of the fugitive 
slave law ; and I have risen to call the attention of the House 
and of the country to the fact, that this agitation of the slave 
question did not commence with the friends of liberty. It 
comes from an entirely different quarter. It comes from the 
Administration party, — from the particular friends of the 
Secretary of State, (Mr. Webster,) who has said so much, and 



AGITATION OE THE SLATE QUESTION. 447 

written so many letters, to "put down agitation" Well, Sir, 
if he really desires to effect that object, let him put down his 
"Union meetings," suppress his "Union letters," silence his 
" hunker papers," quiet his " silver gray " friends. Let him 
go to the Senate chamber, and soothe the agitated elements 
there ; let him quiet that body ; then let him come to this hall, 
and persuade his friends here to attend to the business of the 
nation, to pass our appropriation bills, and to abstain from 
assailing their fellow members; from threatening the people 
with an army to be used in cutting the throats of all who re- 
fuse, at the bidding of the President and of your fugitive law, 
to chase down the flying bondman, as he hurries to a land of 
freedom. 

Sir, when I came here this evening, I had no intention of 
occupying the floor for a single moment. I came with the 
intention to hurry through this bill as rapidly as it could be 
done, and thereby hasten the necessary legislation, which re- 
mains to be perfected before we separate. I was asked and. 
requested to speak on the subject of this fugitive law. T 
replied that I could not ; I had made no preparation, and was 
unwilling, at this late hour of the session, to draw down upon 
myself the unkind feelings which would be excited against me, 
if I were now to speak on that subject, at an hour when every 
member ought to be impatient for the passage of the bills neces- 
sary to carry on the government. 

History will record the events of the present session, and 
will point unerringly to those who have endeavored to> suppress 
legitimate discussion at the proper time, and who now interpo&e 
such speeches as we listened to last evening and to-day, — air a 
moment so unsuited to a calm and dispassionate examination of 
the effects of this fugitive law. What are the facts ? Why, 
Sir, on the first day of the session the President sent us his 
annual message. It contained a full development of his policy, 
and was therefore important to the country. It had ever been 
the practice to discuss the annual message fully in Committee 
of the Whole, at an early period of the session, when we have 
little else to attend to. Our fathers deemed this practice not 



448 AGITATION OF THE SLAVE QUESTION. 

merely right, but expedient and important, in order that the 
country should fully comprehend the policy which was to guide 
the administration. 

In accordance with this long established usage, on the 9th of 
December, while in Committee of the Whole, I ventured to 
express my views upon the message. Before my brief hour 
was out, I saw around me a score of members with anxious 
countenances, awaiting the precise moment that my time would 
expire ; and no sooner had the chairman's mallet touched the 
sounding-board than a scorce of voices demanded the floor ; and 
a motion was made for the committee to rise, for the reason 
that we had just commenced on the short session of Congress, 
and had so much important business to transact, that it became 
us to labor, and not to spend time in discussions. A resolution 
terminating the debate in Jive minutes was instantly adopted ; 
and throughout the whole country I was denounced for thus 
delaying the business of Congress. On Thursday following we 
adjourned over until Monday, and although we could spare but 
'precisely one hour and Jive minutes to discuss the President's 
message, I believe we have found it perfectly convenient to 
spend at least twelve days in doing nothing, and, at least, dur- 
ing fifty other days our sessions have not, I think, averaged 
more than two and a half hours in length. 

Nor is this all ; the general appropriation bills which usually 
call out political discussion, were not reported until the tenth of 
the present month, and the first, I believe, was called up for 
action on Saturday last, there being at that time but eight 
legislative days of the session remaining. Sir, I cannot say 
that this delay was brought about for the purpose of sealing 
the lips of the minority here ; of that the country must judge. 
This army bill and the fortification bill and the navy bill 
might as well have been called up sixty days since as at this 
hour. 

The States have not been called for resolutions, under the 
rules of the House, during the entire session, and no opportu- 
nity has been afforded the opponents of the fugitive slave law 
to present a bill for its repeal, or obtain a vote on that subject. 



AGITATION OF THE SLAVE QUESTION. 449 

Thus, Sir, have the lips of the free soilers been sealed in rela- 
tion to the fugitive law, during the entire session, except the 
humble speech of my own, made, as before stated, on the 9th 
of December. So fully have my political friends appreciated 
these facts, that not one of them has attempted to speak on the 
fugitive law, although I know that many of them have been 
anxious to occupy a brief hour on that subject. 

While the river and harbor bill was under consideration, the 
gentleman from North Carolina, (Mr. Clingman,) and my col- 
league, (Mr. Taylor,) both interposed speeches on the fugitive 
law. Free soilers might have done so, but they appreciated 
the impropriety of thrusting this question before the House on 
that occasion ; and up to this time we have been compelled by 
this parliamentary legerdemain ^to sit in mute silence on this 
important subject. 

In the other end of the capitol, the friends of the Secretary 
of State have been engaged, day after day, in exciting debates 
to " put down agitation." I feel constrained to call attention to 
the debates in that body, before I proceed to the examination of 
the subject which has called out these attacks upon my friend, 
from Massachusetts (Mr. Allen). 

Sir, parliamentary rules, as well as common courtesy, forbid 
all direct allusion to the remarks of gentlemen made m one 
branch of Congress by members of the other. But, Sir, the 
manner in which certain senators have lately extended^ their 
supervision over members of this House, demand at my hands 
a passing notice. 

On Friday last, a distinguished senator from Kentucky, (Mr. 
Clay,) while speaking of the President's late proclamation, and 
the negroes of Boston, is reported to have said : 

" The proclamation is not aimed solely at the miserable negroes,, stimulated 
no doubt, by those outside of the court house, who laid all. the plans, and some 
of whom — one at least — was at the door beckoning to the negroes to come 
in — not a negro — I beg pardon, a white negro — standing at the door beckon- 
ing to the negroes to come in. Does not everybody know that it is not the 
work of those miserable wretches, who are without the knowledge and without 
a perfect consciousness of what became them, or what was their duty ? They 

38* 



450 AGITATION OF THE SLAVE QUESTION. 

are urged on and stimulated by speeches, some of which are made on this floor 
and in the House of Representatives, and by prints which are scattered broad- 
cast throughout the whole country." 

This attack upon the intelligence of the negroes of Boston, I 
think, is in bad taste. Among them is a lawyer of respect- 
able standing, with whom I am acquainted. A large portion 
of them are men of character. They know their rights. They 
understand and appreciate the barbarous character of this law. 
They possessed philanthropy and manhood enough to re*scue 
their brother from the jaws of the Executive" bloodhounds who 
had fastened upon him. For that act I honor and approve 
them. Their names are worthy of standing upon our country's 
history, with those patriots who used Boston harbor as a tea- 
kettle in 1775 ; those who resisted the stamp-act and the tax 
on tea. 

Mr. Mason interrupted Mr. Giddings, and inquired whether 
Mr. G. approved the mob in Boston ? 

Mr. Giddings resumed. That contest, Mr. Chairman, is 
entirely between the administration and its officers on one side, 
and the negroes of Boston on the other. With that I will not 
interfere. All I have to say is, "give them a clear field and 
a fair fight." The senator speaks of them as "miserable 
wretches, without knowledge and without a consciousness of 
what was their duty." Let their action vindicate them from 
these aspersions. 

Mr. Mason wished to know if Mr. Giddings approved of the 
conduct of those white men who were engaged in the mob ? 

Mr. Giddings. I have yet to learn that any white man was 
concerned in it. It was solely the work of the negroes ; they 
managed their own movements, guided their own action, de- 
feated the execution of the fugitive law, and fairly outmanaged 
the slave -catchers. I ask pardon of the negroes for thus con- 
necting them with a class degraded so far below them. But the 
gentleman wants an explicit and more particular avowal of my 
sentiments. I then say to him, that I would not advise forcible 
resistance to this law ; neither would I advise against it. I 
would leave the colored people to act according to the dictates 



AGITATION OF THE SLAVE QUESTION. 451 

of circumstances and of their own judgments. They ought not 
to resist when there is no prospect of success. In this instance 
they rescued their brother from chains, torture, suffering, and 
death, to which this infamous law and the slave-catchers would 
have assigned him. Were I a colored man, as I am a white 
man, I would not hesitate to slay any slave-catcher who should 
attempt to lay hands on my person to enslave me. Nor would 
I stop to inquire whether such person were commissioned by 
the President to seize and manacle me, to rob me of that right 
to liberty with which God has endowed all men. I repeat 
what I said in December : " When human governments over- 
step the bounds of their constitutional powers, in order to rob 
men of life or liberty, their enactments are void ; they impart 
no authority to any human being to perpetrate the crime." 
No, Sir ; neither the President's commission, nor your detesta- 
ble law, imparts any moral right to your slave-catching mar- 
shals to commit murder or piracy, or crimes far transcending 
them in turpitude. 

But I have been led by the gentleman's questions, from the 
remarks of the senator which I had brought to the notice of the 
House. Alluding to the negroes, he says " they are urged and 
stimulated by speeches, some of which are made on this floor 
and in the House of Representatives." Well, Sir, thanks be to 
God and to the founders of our republic, I stand here a free- 
man, the representative of freemen, speaking the convictions of 
my own judgment, avowing my own sentiments, acknowledging 
responsibility only to God and my country, holding in contempt 
the frowns of any individual who would control my political 
actions. Will that senator undertake to say when I shall speak, 
and what I shall say ? But the senator goes further, and says : 

" The proclamation, then, has higher and greater aims. It aims at the main- 
tenance of the law ; it aims at putting down all those who would put down the 
law and the Constitution, be they hlack or white." 

Well, Sir, if the President has aimed his proclamation at gen- 
tlemen on this floor, it will prove like the poet's gun : 

" Deep charged, and ill aimed at duck or plover, 
Bears wide, but kicks the owner over." 



452 AGITATION OP THE SLAVE QUESTION. 

Sir, do I not stand as independent in this hall as the Presi- 
dent in the White House ? — as far above his reach as he is 
above mine ? — with the same right to aim a proclamation at 
him that he has to aim one at me ? Every man who has ex- 
amined tl4* first principles of our government must be conscious 
that it is based upon this perfect independence which the mem- 
bers of this body hold, and the perfect official equality which 
exists between the members of it's various departments. I pos- 
sess the same power to hold the President amenable for his 
opinions or acts that he has to aim his proclamations at 
me. 

But the senator says, " it aims at putting down all those who 
would put down this law." Sir, I hold my commission here 
from one hundred thousand intelligent, independent freemen. 
I came not here by the President's appointment, nor by the 
recommendation of the senator from Kentucky. I hold my 
seat at the will of the people of my district. I am merely their 
agent, to maintain their interests and protect their rights. 
They have placed me in public life ; they, and they alone, can 
put me down. Neither they nor myself are accustomed to lan- 
guage of this character. It smacks too much of the plantation. 
It strikes harshly on the ears of freedom, yet it may be very 
proper when addressed to slaves ; but it is unsuited to a north- 
ern latitude. 

I would put down this law by every constitutional means. I 
would hold it up to the public gaze in all its revolting turpitude. 
I would point every Christian and every philanthropist to its 
barbarous character. 

Mr. McKissock (in his seat). Would you put down the 
Constitution also ? 

Mr. Giddings. I cherish and maintain the Constitution, 
and will vindicate it against this law, here and elsewhere, by the 
wayside and by the fireside, in public and in private. Any man 
who sustains this law puts down the Constitution. Its enact- 
ment was treason to our constitutional compact. It strikes at 
the rights of the people. It attempts to constrain them to vio- 
late their moral duties, their solemn obligations to their fellow 



AGITATION OF THE SLAVE QUESTION. 453 

man, against the dictates of their own judgment and their duties 
to the laws of their States. 

The Constitution has placed under the control of the Federal 
Executive the marshals, deputy-marshals, and federal officers. 
These he can command. They are subject to our control. We 
can also authorize the appointment of a constabulary force, and 
place it under the President's direction, if we deem it necessary. 
We can authorize him to employ the army, the navy, and the 
militia when in actual service. But, Sir, neither Congress nor 
the President can command the officers or the citizens of any 
State, unless while serving as militia. He has no more power 
over them than he has over the people or officers of Canada. 
They may, and always will aid in the execution of all constitu- 
tional and just laws. But the act is voluntary. The President 
caanot command their assistance. ^^ 

J The people of Boston did not see fit to interfere between the A 
administration and the " negroes " of that city. In the name of •* 
humanity I thank them for it, and assure them and the country 
that those whom I represent never will interfere in such case. 
The citizen who would do so, would be driven from decent soci- 
ety in northern Ohio. It is here, on this point, that I take issu(T\ 
with the supporters of this law. That portion which commands 
me to assist in catching slaves, is a flagrant usurpation of power, 
unauthorized by the Constitution. My constituents hold that 
portion of the law in detestation. They spurn and abhor it. I 
say, as I have often said, " my constituents will not help you 
catch your slaves." They will feed the hungry, clothe the 
naked, and direct the wanderer on his way, and use every 
peaceful means to assist him to regain his God-given rights. 
If you pursue your slave there, they will let you catch him, if 
you can. If he defends himself against you, they will rejoice. 
If you press him so hard that he is constrained actually to slay 
you in self-defence, why, Sir, they will look on and submit with k 
proper resignation. In such cases they will carry out theirV^ 

\jpeace principles by abstaining from all interference. The Pres- 
ident may " aim his proclamation at them." The distinguished 
senator may make speeches at them ; but they will not be likely 



454 AGITATION OP THE SLAVE QUESTION. 

to heed either. They look neither to the Senate, nor to the 
White House, for instruction respecting their constitutional 
rights or duties. They have studied them in a different school. 
But, while referring to the senator's speech, I cannot pass 
over his allusion to a distinguished member of the British Par- 
liament ; an orator and philanthropist, whose labors in the 
cause of humanity in Europe, in India, and in America, are 
known to every intelligent reader of our public journals. I 
quote the senator's words : 

" Sir, look at the manner in which a foreign hireling has heen introduced 
into this country, in order to propagate his opinions and doctrines with regard 
to the subversion of one of the institutions of this country. I allude to a man 
who is said to be a member of the British Parliament, by the name of Thomp- 
son. He has been received, not in one place only in Massachusetts, but in vari- 
ous places, and the police on one occasion assembled to protect him, when they 
^had not the heart to assemble around a court of justice to maintain the laws of 
r their country." ''^ 

• This is empty declamation. He attacks none of Mr. Thomp- 

son's doctrines, nor does he attempt to meet his arguments. I 
have read some of that gentleman's speeches, and so far as I 
have become acquainted with his doctrines, I assure you the 
senator will never take issue upon his facts, nor attempt to 
overthrow his principles. But, Sir, this is the only mode in 
which the supporters of this fugitive law meet us. When we 
state our arguments, they will assail us with personalities and 
declamation, in order to divert the public mind from the ques- 
tions in issue. Sir, look over the whole debate in Congress for 
the year past, and you will find this system of evasion and per- 
sonal detraction almost uniformly adopted by the supporters of 
that law. This new and improved system of tactics was car- 
ried out here during the debate of yesterday and to-day, of 
which I will speak hereafter. 

The object of the senator's personal attack is a most sincere 

^ and eloquent advocate of the rights of humanity. He may have 
errors. I know not that I agree with him on all points; but I 
do say that if the senator had pointed us to any erroneous doc-f 
trine of Mr. Thompson, instead of this personal abuse, he 
would have entitled himself to greater respect. 



AGITATION OF THE SLAVE QUESTION. 455 

Sir, I object to this undignified treatment of a distinguished 
member of a foreign government by an American senator. It 
does no honor to the body in which that speech was made. 
But the senator scolds the people of Massachusetts for assem- 
bling to hear Mr. Thompson, when they would not aid in catch- 
ing slaves. "Who authorized the senator to read political or 
moral lectures to the people of Massachusetts ? Was he not 
told a year since that they would not catch slaves ? He then 
insisted that they would, He now finds that his prophecy was 
fallacious, and he evinces his vexation at the disappointment, 
by lecturing the people of the Old Bay State whom they shall 
hear, and to whom they shall not listen. 

Why, Sir, the senator goes far beyond the old " alien and 
sedition laws." Have not the people a right to hear whom 
they please ? May not even " error of opinion be tolerated, 
while truth is left free to combat it ? " This fear of trusting 
the people to discuss any truth, moral, political, or religious, is 
opposed to the intelligence of the age, the whole theory of our 
government ! This is literally a government of the people. 
They are our sovereigns, we their servants. Shall the servant 
dictate to his master what he shall discuss ? What code of 
political faith he shall adopt? This distrust of the intelligence 
of the people, of their ability for self-government, constitutes 
"political infidelity." No man who maintains it, can hold fel- 
lowship with the political church to which I belong. 

I now return to the subject which called forth the speech of 
the gentleman who has just taken his seat, (Mr. Levin). 

As I have already stated, our free soil friends have been 
denied any opportunity to test the sense of this House upon a 
| bill to repeal the fugitive law. No time has been afforded them 
to speak a single hour on that subject since the 9th of Decem- 
ber, without violating all rules of propriety, thereby incurring 
the displeasure of our fellow members. 

Last evening, in the course of legitimate remark upon a sub- 
ject before the House, my friend from Massachusetts (Mr. 
Allen) opposed the placing of a vast amount of the public 
treasure at the disposal of the present Secretary of State. He 



456 AGITATION OF THE SLAVE QUESTION. 

clearly and explicitly stated his reasons ; in calm and unimpas- 
sioned language declared the convictions resting upon his own 
mind. The facts which he stated had previously reached the 
ears of several members of this body. They came to us from 
respectable sources. Of their existence, I entertained no doubt. 
The gentleman (Mr. Allen) was full and explicit in his state- 
ments. No one doubted his convictions of the perfect accu- 
racy of what he stated. The substance consists in the charge, 
that prior to entering upon his official duties, the present Secre- 
tary of State informed his friends in Boston, that he must have 
a pecuniary consideration to induce him to take office ; that 
merchants of New York raised for him twenty-five thousand 
dollars, and those of Boston nineteen thousand dollars, being 
more than twice the amount to which he will be entitled for his 
services from the public treasury, if he serves three years. 

To this charge, the gentleman's colleague replied. I ex- 
pected to hear him ask the House to suspend its opinion until 
the Secretary of State could be consulted ; or that he would 
promptly ask an investigation of the subject on behalf of that 
high functionary. But he did neither. Following out that 
general system of tactics to which I have already referred, he 
commenced a personal assault upon his colleague, for presum- 
ing to call public attention to the subject. Both gentlemen 
were heard again this morning. The particular friend of the 
Secretary (Mr. Ashmun) came up to the point, and denied the 
statements of his colleague, and pronounced them unfounded 
in the aggregate and in detail. For this he declared that he 
had authority, which is understood to have been furnished in 
writing by the Secretary himself. On the other hand, the gen- 
tleman from the Worcester district, Massachusetts, (Mr. Allen,) 
avowed himself ready and able to prove his statements, if the 
House would appoint a committee for that purpose. 

To me it seemed that but one course remained, either for the 
friends or for the opponents of the Secretary of State. That 
was to appoint a committee, and ascertain the facts. Yet the 
gentleman who has particular charge of the Secretary's repu- 
tation, (Mr. Ashmun,) expressed no desire whatever to demon- 



AGITATION OF THE SLAVE QUESTION. 457 

strate the Secretary's innocence by proof. On the contrary, he 
appeared anxious to assail his colleague (Mr. Allen) with gross 
personalities. 

Now, Sir, far be it from me to defend the gentleman from 
the Worcester district, (Mr. Allen). In the first place, his 
character needs no defence ; and, in the second place, he is 
abundantly able to take care of his own reputation, if permit- 
ted to speak for himself. But there are cormorants in this 
body, greedy for executive favors, who, with the rapacity of the 
vulture, pounce upon every member who has the independence 
to think his own thoughts, or speak his own words. This whole 
flock of unclean birds have been hovering around my friend, 
(Mr. Allen,) striking at him with their talons j and each en- 
deavoring to propitiate Executive favor by exhibiting their 
hostility towards a man who dares stand up here and maintain 
the truth. Every candidate for a foreign mission, or a " charge* 
d'affaires/' or consul, thinks to secure his object by assailing 
my friend, (Mr. Allen). 

Mr. Levin. Those offices do not spring from the people, 
and I expect no other than those which the people confer. 

Mr. Giddings. All offices spring from the people, and I 
am sure the gentleman will take any he can get. 

No sooner had the gentleman from the Springfield district, 
Massachusetts, (Mr. Ashmun,) closed his remarks, than the 
reverend gentleman from Alabama, (Mr. Hilliard,) with sacer- 
dotal dignity, demanded a hearing. The gentleman from Mas- 
sachusetts (Mr. Allen) had made no allusion to him, either 
directly or indirectly ; nor is it possible for me to comprehend 
how my friend {Mr. Allen) should have incurred the severe 
displeasure of the clerical gentleman. Soon as the gentleman 
rose, he commenced a high wrought eulogy of the Secretary of 
State. He was ignorant of the facts, and had not the conscience 
to deny the statements which so deeply implicated that func- 
tionary ; but he appeared anxious, by the most fulsome lauda- 
tion, to secure his favor. Instead of advising the House to 
examine the matter, and to wipe from that officer all stain and 
reproach, he appeared desirous to cover all these suspected 
39 



458 AGITATION OF THE SLAVE QUESTION. 

iniquities with a coating of obsequious flattery, " thickly laid 
on." His eulogistic praise was eloquent. I heard it with 
interest, and could almost unite in the desire of a distinguished 
statesman, and wish that we might enjoy " stated preaching " 
of that kind every evening, provided it were true ; but when he 
came to the application of his discourse, and assailed my friend 
from Massachusetts, (Mr. Allen,) for daring to put forth state- 
ments which at that time no one denied, I began to doubt his 
logic, and his policy. 

Sir, instead of these extravagant laudations of the Secretary 
of State, and these attacks upon my friend, (Mr. Allen,) why 
did he not demand an investigation ? Why not ascertain the 
truth of this matter ? Why not inform the country ? If the 
Secretary be innocent, he is most unfortunate in the selection 
of his friends here. I would save him from such friends. 
Were I acting as the friend of the Secretary, I would demand 
an investigation ; I would know the truth of these charges ; I 
would inform the country of the facts. It strikes me that the 
; professed principles of the gentleman, (Mr. Hilliard,) should 
have taught him that truth is more important to the Secretary 
of State at this time than declamation and bombast. If the 
statements of the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Allen) 
shall be sustained by proof, the gentleman from Alabama (Mr. 
Hilliard) will find himself in a very awkward position. He 
will then be constrained to recall all he has uttered. 

Next came the gentleman from Delaware, (Mr. Houston,) 
who, at the close of a short speech, took occasion to express 
his belief that the statements of the gentleman from Massachu- 
setts (Mr. Allen) were unfounded calumnies. Well, Sir, if 
they be such, it becomes that gentleman and the House to de- 
monstrate that fact; to let the country know that a member of 
this body from the old Bay State has wantonly, and without 
cause, preferred charges against the Secretary of State. The 
gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Allen) demands the scru- 
tiny. His friends demand it. Such investigation must impli- 
cate the Secretary of State, or subject my friend (Mr. Allen) 
to the imputation expressed by the gentleman from Delaware. 



AGITATION OF THE SLAVE QUESTION. 459 

Here, then, comes the test. Who seeks, and who avoids inves- 
tigation ? And I say to the House that the friends of the gen- 
tleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Allen) will do all they can to 
obtain it. If they can get a resolution for that purpose before 
the House, they will press it to a vote. They will not hesitate 
to move such resolution, if they can obtain the floor. Then, 
Sir, will come the test. 

I am aware that the friends of the Secretary are already 
endeavoring to find a way for retreat ; some difficult passage 
through which to escape. It has been intimated that, if true, 
the charges do not amount to bribery. In fact, it is said that 
they carry with them no moral turpitude. If true, why has 
his colleague (Mr. Ashmun) denied them? Why has the 
Secretary authorized such denial ? These are important ques- 
tions. If the facts stated by my friend (Mr. Allen) do not 
impeach the honor nor the integrity of the Secretary of State, 
why is that member so bitterly assailed for making statements 
that are harmless ? Sir, I call the attention of this House and 
the country to these contradictions and inconsistencies on the 
part of those who attempt, by raising a cloud of dust in this 
hall, to cover the retreat of the Secretary of State. 

But, Sir, I pass on to the transactions of this evening. Soon 
after our meeting, I moved to strike from the army bill then 
before us, the appropriation of fifty-six thousand dollars for 
enlisting new recruits for the service. I was anxious to explain 
my own views in regard to the amendment, but such was the 
pressure of business upon us, that I could not justify myself in 
occupying even three minutes of our time. Yet the gentleman 
from Pennsylvania (Mr. Levin) rose, and under these circum- 
stances addressed the House at length in favor of maintaining 
a standing army, and assailing free soilers generally, and the 
gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Allen) and myself in par- 
ticular. 

Following the programme laid down by the leaders of the 
administration, he was careful not to deny the charges, but 
rather admitted them to be true, but assailed the gentleman 
from Massachusetts (Mr. Allen) for uttering them. 



460 AGITATION OF THE SLAVE QUESTION. 

Mr. Levin. I reiterate that if the facts were fairly stated, 
they do not reflect upon the Secretary of State. My remarks 
were based upon the supposition that Mr. "Webster had re- 
ceived aid from his friends. 

Mr. Giddings. Surely the gentleman would not have sup- 
posed a falsehood. But suppose he disbelieved the state- 
ment. Still he evidently intended to preserve a place for 
retreat, by an argument intended to show that the charges, 
if true, do not impeach the honor of the Secretary. The 
gentleman from Pennsylvania is a lawyer. He has heard the 
indictment in this case, and in the ancient language of judicial 
proceedings, I demand of him to plead either " guilty " or " not 
guilty." That is the question in which the people are inter- 
ested. The farmers and laborers of the great West desire to 
know the facts. They will wish to understand, in plain and 
explicit language, whether the Secretary of State assumed 
upon himself that office under the assurance, the expecta- 
tion of receiving some forty or fifty thousand dollars of the 
merchants and bankers of New York and Boston. Let them 
once possess the facts, and they will not ask the gentleman nor 
myself to make an argument on the subject. They will form 
their own opinions and act upon the dictates of their own judg- 
ment. 

The gentleman (Mr. Levin) urged the maintenance of the 
army. He declared, if there ever was a time when the army 
ought to be kept up, it is important at this juncture ; and refer- 
red to the charges now made against the Secretary of State as 
the occasion for supporting the army. Well, Sir, he desires an 
army to put down the freedom of debate in this hall. He very 
significantly pointed at my humble self, and spoke of the doc- 
trines which I advocate, — doctrines avowed by Jefferson and 
Hancock, and a mighty host of patriots and statesmen who 
have gone before us. These doctrines consist of " self-evident 
truths." He desires an army to put them down, to prevent the 
promulgation of principles held sacred by our fathers, to stop 
discussion, " to put down agitation." 

Mr. Levin. I confess that I am an agitator. What storms 



AGITATION OF THE SLAVE QUESTION. 461 

are to the atmosphere, — what tempests to the ocean, — the 
agitator is to the political world. He puts its particles into 
motion, he produces an excitement which carries off the cor- 
ruptions and scum that have been accumulating for years. I 
am an agitator for good, but not for evil, — to protect, but not 
to destroy. 

Mr. Giddings. Well, Sir, we are all conscious that much 
scum has been thrown off here within the last twenty-four 
hours. But to proceed with my remarks. The gentleman 
thinks an army should be maintained for another purpose, — 
to compel the people to carry out this fugitive law ; a law 
enacted by a minority of the Senate and of the House ; a law 
enacted by slave-holders and a few of their northern allies, 
while the mass of the northern members fled from the Senate 
chamber and from this body; a law which is odious to all the 
free States, which commands the people to leave their firesides 
and work-shops to aid in seeking out the hunted fugitive. The 
people refuse to perform that detestable service, and we are to 
maintain an army to cut their throats for such refusal. We, 
the servants of the people, want an army to butcher our mas- 
ters, because they will not obey this odious law ! In fact, this 
is substantially the doctrine of the President's late message. 

Mr. Levin. Let the country remember that the gentleman 
boldly proclaims that no man is bound to obey the laws unless 
he approves of their justice, and that each individual is in- 
vested with the power of judicial construction ! A solecism 
like this applies the axe to the very root of our government. 

Mr. Giddings. Sir, that man has lived to little purpose 
who, at the age of forty, does not know that a standing army, 
in time of peace, is the bane of free governments. It is the 
instrument of tyrants and usurpers. For what purpose would ' 
the President now use the army, except to enforce this odious 
law; to subject the people of the North to the slave power; 
to shoot them down if they refuse to violate their own sympa- 
thies and God's commands ? I would say to gentlemen, here 
and elsewhere, that the advocates of freedom are not to be 
intimidated. They know their power ; it is the power of truth- 
39* 



462 AGITATION OF THE SLAVE QUESTION. 

They see it operating upon the popular mind. The great heart 
of this mighty nation beats in unison with our doctrines. This 
feeling is increasing and extending into every vein and artery 
of society. Its power at this moment holds in check the legis- 
latures of four sovereign States of this Union, neither of which 
is able to elect senators to Congress who oppose the truth we 
preach. Our progress is onward. Neither threats of using the 
army, nor the army itself can retard the rapid advance of 
truth. 

No cry of " danger to the Union " can alarm the people, or 
frighten them into obedience to this law. This " ignis fatuus " 
of dissolution has for more than a year constituted the entire 
capital on which certain political leaders have traded. A 
greater humbug was never conceived or brought forth. The 
gigantic intellect of the Secretary of State, aided by the politi- 
cal experience of certain distinguished senators and politicians, 
could alone have given birth to this " splendid failure" which, 
if put forth by men in the more humble walks of life, would 
have entitled them to lodgings in some lunatic asylum. There 
is but one mitigating consideration connected with it ; that is 
the consistency with which the President and his cabinet are 
striving to keep up the deception. The late proclamation 
against the negroes of Boston, constitutes a burlesque upon 
civil governments which is strictly in keeping with "Union 
meetings " and the cry of " danger to the Union," put forth in 
this House, in the Senate, and by the Executive. 

The history of the times will show these things in their true 
light, and place these disunion panics among the most extraor- 
dinary inventions of any age. The authors should at once 
obtain patents both here and in Europe. Sir, I have been be- 
'trayed into a much longer speech than I intended. I now 
come to the present position of the subject which has brought 
upon my friend from Massachusetts such an avalanche of 
denunciation. That gentleman made statements of facts. If 
true, the country is entitled to know them. They are impor- 
tant. The Secretary of State exerts great influence in the 
government. He is in truth regarded as the "master-spirit 



AGITATION OF THE SLAVE QUESTION. 463 

which guides the ship of State." If he took that station as the 
employee of merchants, brokers, and bankers of New York 
and Boston ; if they bestowed upon him forty or fifty thousand 
dollars to induce him to go into the cabinet, it follows as an 
irresistible conclusion that he is now acting as their agent, and 
not as the agent of the people generally. The facts stated by 
the gentleman from Massachusetts, (Mr. Allen,) will explain 
the efforts of this Secretary in favor of " Union meetings ; " 
the letters he has written in favor of the " fugitive law ; " the 
energy he has exerted to suppress the freedom of speech, 
under pretence of "putting down agitation;" the speeches he 
has made ; the dinners he has eaten, and the wine he has 
drunk, " to save the Union." Forty -five thousand dollars con- 
stitute a fair price for all these labors to protect the commerce 
of those cities, with the slave States, from interruption. 

Sir, it is a law of mind that we should sustain the interests 
of those from whom we receive our bread ; that we should con- 
sult the welfare of those on whom we are dependent. The mer- 
chants and bankers of Wall street and of State street never did, 
and never will give their money in such profusion, without 
expecting a " quid pro quo." If they have bestowed forty 
thousand dollars on the Secretary of State, they expect his ser- 
vices in return. They expect him to consult their interest. 
He will do it. Their interest is opposed to that of the laborer, 
the farmer, the mechanic. They want your splendid lines of 
mail steamers, your powerful navy, your numerous army ; all 
of which are opposed to the interests of the great body of the 
people. 

Sir, the people have a right to understand these facts. It 
was due to them that the truth should be placed before the 
country. It is due to the honorable Secretary that he should 
have an opportunity to vindicate himself from these imputa- 
tions. The gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. Allen) acted 
no less in accordance with his duty to the Secretary of State 
than with that which was due to his constituents and the coun- 
try, in calling attention to this subject. His statements were 
not lightly made, without consideration. He frankly pledged 



464 AGITATION OF THE SLAVE QUESTION. 

himself to prove them, if an opportunity shall be afforded. 
That opportunity can be given at any moment that the Secre- 
tary shall desire. He, an officer of government, can demand 
an investigation as a matter of privilege. Will he do it ? His 
friends control the business of the House ; they can move an 
investigation at any time. Will they do it ? If they do not, 
others will see it performed, if they possess the power. 

Mr. Chairman, when an innocent man is charged with impro- 
priety, his first wish and desire is to demonstrate to the whole 
world the falsehood, the injustice of the charge. A late cabi- 
net officer, (Mr. Crawford,) when thus charged at the last ses- 
sion of Congress, did not hesitate for a moment. He sent his 
demand here for an investigation ; we acknowledged his right 
to it, and appointed a committee. I speak with some experi- 
ence. At our last session I was myself charged, through the 
public press, with facts which, if they had existed, should have 
excluded me from a seat in this hall. I did not wait to cast 
imputations upon my accuser ; such a policy did not enter my 
mind. I did not wait an hour, but demanded an investigation 
by this body. I was conscious that a demonstration of my own 
innocence would constitute a conviction of my accuser. And I 
would say to the friends of Holq Secretary of State, that, if he be 
as pure as they represent him, they need not waste time in 
attacking my friend (Mr. Allen). Call for a committee. Let 
the facts be known ; and if the Secretary be free from these 
charges, the development of that innocence will save them the 
trouble of assaulting the gentleman who has called our atten- 
tion to the subject. 

It has been objected that we have not time to make the inves- 
tigation before our adjournment. It is true we have not time 
to bring witnesses from Boston or New York ; still, if I am 
rightly informed, members on this floor can state facts which, if 
published to the country, would throw light on this transaction. 
I have good reason to believe gentlemen here could give us 
much information. Indeed, rumor would lead us to suppose 
there were members of this body whose pockets were lighter in 
consequence of the facts stated by the gentleman from Massa- 



AG-TTATTON" OF THF. ST.AVF. QLh5llU-\. 465 

chusetts, (Mr. Allen). It is also said that other testimony may 
be obtained, without going beyond the limits of this city. In- 
deed, it is said, that a gentleman who paid over a part of the 
money is now among us. 

Again, the committee would at once hear the whole story of 
the Secretary himself. He would have the benefit of vindicat- 
ing himself in an honorable and legitimate manner before the 
whole country. 

Xow, if that functionary and his friends refuse to avail them- 
selves of this opportunity of vindicating his innocence, what 
will the people think ? "What will every reflecting person think 
of such a policy, so incompatible with his innocence ? 

Under such circumstances, we see his friends denying the 
accuracv of the statements against him. but refusing to demon- 
strate his innocence in a manner which must silence all his 
opponents. ' And then they turn round and assail the gentle- 
man who stated the facts, and stigmatize him as a calumniator. 

I would say to those gentlemen, that, should they succeed in 
rendering the character of my friend as unworthy as his col- 
league represented it; should they put him down, and destroy 
his fair fame, it will in no degree relieve the Secretary of State. 
Truth is unchanging, eternal, and is the same, whether uttered 
by a fiend or an angel of light ! The voice that pronounces 
truth, neither changes nor modifies its essence. It is one of the 
attributes of the " Eternal Mind" and is as unchangeable as 
" Deity himself \" If that truth be unfavorable to the Secre- 
tary of State, no subterfuge, no attacks upon others, nor vilifi- 
cation of those who bring forward these charges, can impair its 
effects upon him. If the truth be favorable to his innocence, 
the sooner it shall be understood, the better for him and for the 
country. 

Under the circumstances which surround this question, I give 
it as the conviction of my own mind, that, if neither the Secre- 
tary nor his friends ask an investigation ; if they suffer this ses- 
sion of Congress to close, without giving him an opportunity to 
manifest his innocence — such conduct will constitute in the 
public mind satisfactory evidence of the accuracy of the state- 



466 AGITATION OF THE SLAVE QUESTION. 

ments made by the gentleman from Massachusetts, (Mr. 
Allen). 

The people have a high and important interest in this sub- 
ject. They have a right to understand the facts. As one of 
their representatives, I respectfully call on the Secretary of 
State for his own version of this matter, through a committee 
of this House, before our session closes. I respectfully ask his 
friends on this floor to aid us in constituting such a committee ; 
and let us have such facts as they may obtain before this Con- 
gress shall dissolve. Sir, let these imputations of venality be 
removed from the Executive cabinet ; let it be purified, not 
merely from this charge, but from the suspicion of corruption. 



THE COMPROMISE MEASURES. 



THE ACTS OF CONGRESS WHICH CONSTITUTE THEM— WHIGS AND DEMO- 
CRATS COMMITTED TO THEIR SUPPORT — THE CHARACTER OF THOSE 
LAWS — THE CRIME OF SUSTAINING THEM — PROSPECTIVE INCREASE OF 
SLATES — CORRESPONDING INCREASE OF EXPENSE IN SUPPORTING THAT 
INSTITUTION — THE PEOPLE OF THE FREE STATES OUGHT NOT TO BE 
INVOLVED IN THIS CRIME OR EXPENSE — THEY WILL SEPARATE THEM- 
SELVES FROM THEM. 

[On the day of the meeting of Congress, in December, 1851, the whigs met in 
caucus, and resolved to sustain the "compromise measures." The democrats 
met also, and laid similar resolutions on the table. At twelve o'clock, the mem 
bers of all parties met in the hall of representatives to organize. But before a 
vote was taken for Speaker, a discussion arose upon the subject of slavery. 
This agitation for suppressing agitation, continued at almost every meeting of 
the House until the 16th of March. Up to that time, no free soiler had mingled 
in those debates. On that day, Mr. Hillyer of Georgia, while speaking on the 
subject, referred distinctly to Mr. Giddings, and assured him that, notwith- 
standing all the efforts of the anti-slavery men, negroes bore as high a price at 
the South as they had done at any previous time. Mr. Giddings then obtained 
the floor to reply, and delivered the following speech.] 

Mr. Chairman, — The discussion of these questions, touch- 
ing slavery, are precipitated upon us at most unpropitious peri- 
ods. Indeed, it appears difficult for us to extricate ourselves 
from those exciting subjects which it has been the object of the 
administration to keep out of view. Thus far, the agitation has 
been kept up and continued solely by those who denounce agi- 
tation. From the commencement of our session, I have en- 

* Speech on the Deficiency Bill. Delivered in Committee of the whole 
House on the state of the Union, March 16, 1852. 



468 THE COMPROMISE MEASURES. 

deavored, so far as able, to guide the business of this body in 
the regular and appropriate channels marked out by our pre- 
decessors in the earlier and better days of the republic. I 
endeavored, by the small influence which I could command, to 
take up the President's message in the first months of the ses- 
sion. On examining that document, all parties could have 
brought forward their views. Each member would then have 
had an appropriate opportunity to define his position on the 
slave question. It would have been discussed ; and, when dis- 
cussed, it would have been laid aside, and we should now have 
been engaged in the legitimate subject before us ; but a differ- 
ent policy has prevailed. The friends of slavery, while profess- 
ing to do all in their power to silence agitation, are constantly 
agitating in order to put down agitation. The gentleman from 
Georgia, (Mr. Hillyer,) who has just taken his seat, professing 
a horror at agitation, could not resist the temptation to boast of 
the high price of human flesh in his State, notwithstanding the 
efforts of our philanthropists in favor of civilization and human- 

Now, Sir, I will say to him, that I regretted that declaration. 
This does not appear to be the appropriate place for the expres- 
sion of such barbarous ideas. It would have been better fitted 
to the quarter-deck of an African slaver, or to the barracoons 
of the African coast, than to this forum. But, Sir, I love to see 
men express the honest emotions of their hearts. The time 
and place are matters of taste rather than of principle. But 
while the slave-holders and their allies are deprecating all agi- 
tation, they are constantly discussing the subject themselves. 

Sir, on the morning of the first day of the present session, 
one of the great political parties of this body, in caucus assem- 
bled, resolved to sustain the compromise measures of the late 
Congress. The other, assembled in like manner, laid similar 
resolutions on the table. The support of these measures 
became a subject of agitation and discussion, before we had 
proceeded so far as even to ballot for a Speaker ; and few 
days have since passed, in which a portion of the time has not 
been occupied by such agitation. 



THE COMPROMISE MEASURES. 469 

The compromise, I understand, to consist of a series of laws 
enacted by the late Congress, consisting, first, of the law which 
admits California as a State. The object of that bill being 
accomplished, no attempt to disturb it will of course be made. 
Secondly, that which defines the boundaries of Texas. This, 
too, has accomplished its object, and is therefore settled, and no 
longer a subject of controversy. Those establishing govern- 
ments in our territories, that excluding the slave-breeders of 
Maryland and Virginia from the markets of this district, and 
that for the recapture of fugitive slaves, are in operation, — 
subject, like other statutes, to modification or repeal. But it is 
said, that all questions of slavery were settled by the passage 
of these laws ; that they are to operate as a final quietus of the 
whole slavery agitation. 

These ideas were not advanced in this body at the time those 
bills were passed. Indeed, if my recollection be correct, there 
was no discussion upon the passage of the fugitive law, or the 
laws establishing governments in Utah and New Mexico. 
They were passed under the previous question, without exam- 
ination. Few members of that Congress, I think, entertained 
the absurd notion that their action would impose any obligation 
upon those who should succeed them. I must judge of my own 
duties, and so must other gentlemen ; and the corruptions or 
follies of the past Congress can never excuse me for violating 
justice and propriety. Few members from the free States who 
voted for these measures have survived the storm of popular 
indignation, brought upon themselves by the passage of those 
laws. Their successors were sent here for the very purpose of 
repealing these enactments ; and I am of opinion that it will 
require strong argument to convince them that the reprehensi- 
ble conduct of their predecessors is to control and govern this 
Congress. 

I am aware that men in high official stations have announced 
to the country that the slave questions are settled, — that all 
agitation has ceased. But what are the facts ? We see and 
know that discussion has increased and extended more rapidly 
since the enactment of those laws than at any former period. 

40 



470 THE COMPROMISE MEASURES. 

Our elections are very generally made to depend on the 
slave question. It has placed new and able members in the 
Senate, and it has driven others into retirement. It has occa- 
sioned great changes in this body. Where now are the north- 
ern members who advocated these compromise measures? 
Gone, Sir, most of them to that land of political forgetfulness 
from which they will never return. What questions entered 
into the late contest in New Hampshire? What were the 
issues in Massachusetts at her late autumnal election ? What 
has occasioned the political revolution in Ohio ? These elec- 
tions turned upon the question of slavery. And while on this 
point, I would ask what has blasted and withered the last polit- 
ical hopes of the present Secretary of State ? Every man 
knows that it is this very question of slavery. While he has 
been writing letters and making speeches to demonstrate that 
the slave agitation had ceased, it was operating in the popular 
mind, was silently stealing his political breath, and has now 
pronounced the sentence of death to his political hopes. In 
most of our elections for State and county officers, it is rapidly 
becoming the principal disturbing element. The people in 
some portions of the country will not confide in those who are 
the advocates of freedom, in other parts they will confide in no 
other. 

The institution of slavery has increased its victims, in sixty 
years, from six hundred thousand to three millions. 

The slave States, early finding themselves unable to hold 
their bondmen in subjection, called on the Federal Govern- 
ment to assist them in recovering their fugitives from the 
Indians. Without discussion, or, so far as we know, without 
objection, the Executive power effected a treaty providing for 
the return of fugitive slaves to their masters. This constituted 
a precedent. Another similar treaty followed. The Indians 
failed to live up to their stipulations. The sending of their 
fellow men back to chains and bondage was a barbarity at 
which they revolted. At length the first Seminole war ensued. 
Then the second. And untold millions of the people's money 
\was squandered in returning them to bondage. 



THE COMPROMISE MEASURES. 471 

Slavery and the slave-trade, in this district, was established 
early in the present century ; and in a few years thereafter, 
Congress established the coastwise slave-trade. As the insti- 
tution increased, more slave territory was demanded. Louisi- 
ana was purchased ; then Florida. Texas was annexed. 
War with Mexico followed, and vast territory was acquired. 
Three millions slaves could not be held in bondage by the 
power of the slave States. We were called on to permit the 
institution to be extended into our territories, — we dad so;, to 
give free territory to Texas, — and we did it ; to pay her for 
territory which our arms had conquered, — and we did it ; to 
take upon the nation the burden of capturing and returning 
fugitive slaves ; to appoint officers or slave-catchers in all parts 
of the free States ; to subject the citizens of the North to the 
expenses and disgrace of chasing down the hunted fugitive, as 
he flies from a land of chains and sighs and tears. The people 
of the free States have witnessed these things. They know 
them to be unconstitutional — violations of their rights- — inhir- 
man and barbarous. They, of course, understand that the 
remedy is with themselves, and they are endeavoring to cast 
these burdens from them. And they will do it. 

Looking forward, as all reflecting men must, we see that in 
sixty years more we shall have twenty millions slaves in the 
United States, — a greater number than our present white 
population. Now, Sir, if this Federal Government is to take 
upon itself the burden and expense of holding that vast num- 
ber of human beings in bondage ; if we are to appoint officers 
to catch all who shall hereafter attempt to regain their free- 
dom, and to pay the expenses of returning them to bondage-; 
if we are to provide territory for them, and to maintain slave 
markets for such a population, we shall, at no distant day, find 
ourselves involved in business which may well occupy our 
whole time. 

For three years past, this body has done very little except to 
legislate for slavery. But what else can it do, when that insti- 
tution shall be three times as great as it now is ? Sir, this agi- 
tation will increase as slavery increases, unless this government 



472 THE COMPROMISE MEASURES. 

shall respect the constitutional rights of the free States, and 
relieve them from the burdens, the disgrace, and the crimes of 
that institution. 

I have so often discussed the constitutional rights of the 
several States respecting slavery, that I now feel no disposition 
to repeat the doctrines on which I base my political action ; 
but I may be permitted to say, that Congress has no more right 
to bestow its energies for the support of the slavery of the 
South, than it has to sustain their banks, their railroads, or 
their system of apprenticeship, or the laws of those States 
respecting minors, or those which regulate the rights of hus- 
band and wife. Slavery, with all these subjects, are matters 
which each State must regulate for itself, and with which this 
government has no right to interfere, and with which we can- 
not interfere, except at the expense of the constitutional rights 
of the North. 

To this view of our constitutional obligations, both the great 
political parties of the nation are committed. I need only 
quote the resolution of this House in December, 1838, which 
is in the following words : 

" That this government is a government of limited powers, and that, by the 
Constitution of the United States, Congress has no jurisdiction whatever over 
the institution of slavery in the several States of this Confederacy." 

This resolution was introduced by a distinguished democratic 
member, and was sustained by a vote of one hundred and 
ninety-eight yeas to six nays; nearly every member of both 
parties voting for it. The Baltimore platform contains reso- 
lutions substantially embracing this doctrine ; and now the 
entire democratic party of the nation stands pledged before the 
world to maintain this important right of the people of each 
State, to hold just such an attitude, in regard to slavery, as to 
them shall appear just and reasonable. Such, too, were the 
positions of the whig party, up to the passage of the com- 
promise measures, to which I have referred. Indeed, the 
whigs were more strongly committed to this policy than were 
the democrats. The free democracy at Buffalo adopted this 
great leading principle of State rights, as the basis of their 



THE COMPROMISE MEASURES. 473 

organization. But the distinction which marked that party as 
separate from both the others was, and still is, a determination 
to bring into practice this important doctrine, upon the mainte- 
nance of which the liberty and the rights of the people depend ; 
while both the other parties have, practically, deserted their 
professed and avowed principles. 

To the maintenance of the compromise measures as a final 
settlement of the slave question, the President, in his message, 
exhorts the people to adhere. The whig and the democratic 
parties are each striving to go beyond the other in their devo- 
tion to this plan for silencing all further agitation of the ques- 
tions of liberty and slavery. The whigs, at the commencement 
of this Congress, apparently got the start of their competitors 
in servility. They passed resolutions, pledging their party to 
the support of the compromise. And here, in this hall, certain 
leading members publicly boasted of the fact, before we had 
even commenced the election of our officers. I do not say that 
the whole whig party were present at the caucus, but tile act 
has gone forth as the act of the party. Those individuals who 
were present, evidently thought that servility to the slave 
power was the only means of securing political success. But 
we are given to understand, by leading democrats and by the 
press of that party, that their national convention will do that 
which their congressional caucus refused to do, by passing reso- 
lutions pledging their party and their candidate to maintain the 
compromise measures. On the other hand, we are now told 
that the whigs will play dark ; that they will make no avowal 
of principles, but will select as their standard-bearer a gentle- 
man of acknowledged military renown ; will spike his cannon, 
take the flints from their own muskets, and go forth to the con- 
flict without music, wrapt in the silence of a funeral.. 

And now, Mr. Chairman, the question comes home to every 
elector of this nation ; to every man, woman, and child, whether 
bond or free. What ivill be the effect of maintaining the com- 
promise ? What the effect of silencing further agitation of the 
slave question ? These are important inquiries, which, as yet, 
40* 



474 THE COMPROMISE MEASURES. 

have never been answered ; nor have they been discussed in 
this body. 

The first consequence resulting from the support of the com- 
promise, will be to maintain slavery and the slave-trade in this 
district. 

As observed on a former occasion, in 1801 Congress passed 
a law, by which the institution of slavery in this district, with 
its attendant commerce in human flesh, was continued and es- 
tablished under congressional enactment. That law remains 
in force to this day. Here, Sir, under our own observation, 
within our own jurisdiction, by virtue of our own laws, man is 
degraded, robbed of his intellectual enjoyments, kept in deplora- 
ble ignorance, and disrobed of his manhood. By virtue of those 
laws, he is transformed into a chattel, brutalized, and sold like 
swine. Here, Sir, men and women are bred for market. Beings 
in human shape follow the business of rearing boys and girls 
for sale ; and by that business sustain themselves and families, 
and accumulate wealth. 

To sustain the compromise is to sustain this revolting prac- 
tice, — to give these slave-breeders license and encouragement 
to pursue an occupation abhorrent to every feeling of Christian- 
ity and of decency. Yet, Sir, the whig members of this body, 
on the first day of our session, resolved, distinctly and emphat- 
ically, to support this practice, which is spurned and held in 
disgust by Mohammedan governments. I wish to be under- 
stood, and therefore repeat, that the support of the compromise 
measures is identified with and inseparable from the support of 
slave-breeding and slave-dealing, now carried on in this district. 
To sustain the compromise is to sustain these practices. To 
prohibit the slave-trade here, would violate this pretended com- 
promise. 

It is required, I understand, of each of the democratic can- 
didates for President, that he shall sustain the compromise, and 
thereby lend Iris whole official influence to uphold and encour- 
age the breeding and sale of slaves in this district. Unless 
pledged to this, he cannot receive the support of that party ; 
while the whig candidate is to say nothing about it, to express 



THE COMPROMISE MEASURES. 475 

no opinion in regard to it, to stand neutral upon the subject.* 
To stand neutral, to do nothing, is to lend an influence in favor 
of this growing human flesh for the purposes of sale. This 
traffic in the bodies of females depends on the voice of Con- 
gress. If we say stop, it ceases forever ; if we are silent, it 
continues. To remain supinely silent, is to continue it. 

Now, I do not think there is a member on this floor from a 
free State, who dare speak out boldly and say to this House 
and to the country that he is in favor of this breeding of man- 
kind for the shambles ; that he approves of this traffic in God's 
image. If any member from the free States should do it, I 
think it would seal his political fate. Yet gentlemen do not 
hesitate to rise here and declare their intention to support the 
compromise, thereby lending their entire influence to sustain 
this business of breeding human cattle for the market. I re- 
spectfully ask the gentleman from New York, (Mr. Brooks,) 
who first publicly swore allegiance to this compromise, whether 
he is in favor of sustaining this traffic in human flesh? I 
desire to understand the position of gentlemen, and hope they 
will stand up manfully and avow their doctrine and their 
policy. I therefore respectfully ask the gentleman to say what 
he will do in regard to this slave-trade ? "Will he vote to con- 
tinue or to abolish it ? I await his answer. 

[Mr. Giddings having made a pause, and Mr. Brooks making 
no answer, Mr. G. proceeded.] 

Inasmuch as that gentleman remains silent, I respectfully 
ask any other northern man who sustains the compromise, to 
say whether he is willing to sustain this traffic in human flesh ? 
I repeat, that I understand the compromise to embrace this 
slave-trade ; that if we sustain the compromise, we must sus- 
tain this traffic. And I desire to see gentlemen stand up, like 
honest, honorable men, like the representatives of freemen, and 
avow their sentiments ; and if there be a northern member 



* This policy was changed at the Baltimore convention of 1852, and the 
■whig platform there adopted, pledged its party to the support of the compro- 
mise measures. 



476 THE COMPROMISE MEASURES. 

who will avow himself in favor of this traffic, in the face of 
this House and of the country, I desire to hear him, and I 
await a response. 

[No member answering, Mr. Giddings resumed.] 

Inasmuch as I have been addressing whigs more particularly, 
I will also inquire of gentlemen on the other side of the House 
on this point. I noticed the letter of the gentleman from New 
Hampshire (Mr. Hibbard) to his constituents, alluded to by the 
gentleman who preceded me. I understand that he considered 
himself pledged to support the compromise. I should like to 
know whether he will sustain the slave-trade in this district ? 

Mr. Hibbard. I voted for the bill of the last Congress 
abolishing the slave-trade in the District of Columbia. That 
vote explains my views on that subject. If the gentleman 
wishes to know whether I would vote for a bill abolishing sla- 
very in the district, or the trade between the people of the dis- 
trict, I answer that I should vote against it. I am opposed to 
the further agitation of the subject. 

Mr. Giddings. I thank the gentleman for his frankness. I 
understand him, and the country understands him. I was mis- 
taken in supposing there was no man from a free State who 
would sustain this commerce in the bodies of women and chil- 
dren. But I like to see a man bold, even in his iniquities. I 
have more respect for the gentleman who thus says what he 
will do, than I have for members who refuse to speak, but cast 
their votes and exert their influence to maintain this slave- 
trade. I presume the gentleman honestly represents the views 
of his people, that they approve of this breeding of men and 
women for market. 

But the compromise embraces also the slave-trade upon our 
southern coast. All are aware that, by the ninth section of the 
act of 1807, slave-dealers are authorized to carry (under cer- 
tain regulations) slaves from one port of the United States to 
another, under the flag of our Union. Men, women, and chil- 
dren are purchased in this district, and in the northern slave 
States, and placed on board these slave-ships and carried to the 
torture and premature deaths, which, it is well known, await 



THE COMPROMISE MEASURES. 477 

them upon the cotton and sugar plantations. There they are 
murdered under a slow torture by the lash of inhuman over- 
seers. It is estimated that twenty thousand human victims are 
thus annually sacrificed to southern barbarity. The blood of 
those victims rests upon the members of this body. 

We have the power to stop this flood of human gore. But, 
while these victims toil in chains, and sigh and weep under the 
tortures to which our law consigns them, members here refuse 
to examine this subject, refuse to permit the introduction of a 
bill to repeal this law ; but they stand here and exert their ut- 
most powers to revive, to galvanize into life, the old party 
issues on which they have heretofore contended. They endeavor 
to close their eyes to notorious facts, and soothe their con- 
sciences by occupying their own attention, and that of others, 
upon the miserable party conflicts, which have no higher mo- 
tive or aim than to secure the spoils of office to one or the 
other political party. I judge not for others, but so far as I 
am myself concerned, I should feel far less guilt were I to 
strike a stiletto to the heart of a single victim, than I should to 
exert my influence to sustain that slave-trade, or than I should 
were I to sit here in silence and permit that infamous traffic to 
continue without uttering my solemn protest against it. 

It is frequently the case, that men and women, apparently 
doomed to the tortures of the far South by this trade, commit 
suicide rather than meet its horrors. All will recollect the 
story of the father, mother, and children confined in a slave 
prison in a neighboring State, destined to the southern market. 
The parents, having deliberated upon their situation, and that 
of their children, took the lives of their offspring, and then 
sought death by their own hands. Do not we who sit in this 
hall, and by our silence and inaction continue this slave-trade, 
share in the guilt of those dark and damning iniquities ? Does 
not the blood of those victims stain our garments ? And, when 
we appear at the bar of final retribution, shall we plead this 
compromise as a justification for crimes which would strike ter- 
ror to a savage heart ? 

I am aware that some of my colleagues have pledged them- 



478 THE COMPROMISE MEASURES. 

selves to sustain these compromise measures, thereby uphold- 
ing this slave-trade. Now, Sir, I wish to inquire of those gen- 
tlemen whether they are willing to rise on this floor, and say 
frankly to the people of our State that they are in favor of sup- 
porting this slave-trade ? I desire a full and fair understand- 
ing on this subject. I wish to understand the position of the 
whig party of my own State. Will they sustain this coast- 
wise slave-trade, or will they not ? or are they to play dark 
and keep silent ? I mean no disrespect to my colleagues of 
either party. I am solicitous that the people of Ohio should 
understand how each of their representatives stands on these 
questions. 

The people of the North have been deceived long enough by 
politicians, who proclaim their intention to sustain the com- 
promise, without descending to particulars and explaining what 
they mean by such support. Indeed, gentlemen dare not avow 
their intention to sustain the slave-trade in this district, upon 
our southern coast, and in our territories, and to maintain the 
infamous fugitive slave law. It was a truism uttered by my 
Lord Coke, when he said, " fraud lurketh in generalities." 
This general expression in favor of sustaining the compromise, 
embraces all these iniquities ; and when a man, either here or 
elsewhere, avows himself in favor of the compromise measures, 
he, in substance and fact, avows himself in favor of breeding 
men and women for market in this district and in our territo- 
ries, and of prostituting our flag to the protection of a com- 
merce in human flesh. I would be as willing to traffic in God's 
image, as I would to sustain the owner of yonder slave prison 
in his accursed vocation, by upholding the law which author- 
izes him to pursue it. I would as soon vote for Williams, the 
slave-dealer and owner of yonder barracoon, to the office of 
President, as I would for any man who sustains him in his exe- 
crable commerce. Yet, Sir, strange as it may seem, your 
presidential candidates of the democratic party appear to think 
they will have no chance of success, unless they patronize those 
worse than savage practices, while the whig candidate is to 
keep silence in regard to them. 



THE COMPROMISE MEASURES. 479 

But the compromise was intended also to, and, if observed, 
must, forever, close all hope of excluding slavery or the slave- 
trade from our territories. On this point, there is no longer 
uncertainty. The official returns from Utah show that slavery 
exists there. Servile politicians can no longer deny the fact. 
The honorable Secretary of State, I think, will not repeat that 
gigantic falsehood which he put forth in the Senate on the 7th 
of March, 1850, when he asserted that slavery was " excluded 
from that country by the laws of God." Indeed, at the time 
when that attempt to deceive the people of the North was 
made, it was known here and throughout the country that sla- 
very existed in Utah. The fact had been published some two 
months previously in most of our leading newspapers ; and if 
the author of that declaration was ignorant of the fact, I think 
he was the only member of Congress uninformed on that point. 
Slavery also exists in New Mexico, as we have seen by the 
public press. 

Now if the compromise be sustained, then are these territo- 
ries to be delivered over to the curse of slavery. The soil 
which, under Mexican law, had been consecrated to freedom, is 
now, under American law, to be cursed with the most degrad- 
ing oppression that exists upon earth ; and slave markets are 
to be established, and men bought and sold, and women made 
the subjects of purchase and sale, on territory conquered by 
our arms. To vote for presidential candidates who uphold the 
compromise, is to vote for slavery, for the slave-trade, with its 
attendant crimes, to continue in those territories. 

Mr. Chairman, when I hear members on this floor rise and 
proclaim their intention to support the compromise, I under- 
stand them to say emphatically, that they have made up their 
minds to support slavery in this district and in the territories ; 
and to maintain the slave-trade, with all its crimes and guilt, 
here, and in the territories, and on our southern coast. If gen- 
tlemen mean any thing by their declarations, they mean this. 
When they say the slave question is settled, they intend to be 
understood by southern men as giving their influence in favor 
of maintaining slavery and the slave-trade, wherever they now 



480 THE COMPROMISE MEASURES. 

exist under the laws of the Federal Government. I desire the 
people of the North to understand them. I rose to speak for 
this purpose. I ever have been, am now, and trust I ever 
shall be, hostile to political deception and double-dealing. I 
desire to see gentlemen openly maintain their opinions at home 
and in this hall. I have no respect for that man who will hold 
one set of doctrines before the people, and then lend his influ- 
ence to overthrow them here. The people have no respect for 
such men ; nor do I believe that such men have respect for 
themselves. 

Mr. Chairman, who that held a seat in this hall, during the 
last and present Congress, could listen to the gentleman from 
Massachusetts, (Mr. Rantoul,) who spoke so frankly and so 
ably a few days since, and help comparing that speech with the 
conduct of a certain honorable member from the same State, 
(Mr. Winthrop,) who, in the last Congress, fled from the hall 
in dismay, rather than to give a vote on a pending question, 
lest that vote would show his constituents and the country his 
position on the subject of slavery. I care nothing for political 
names. The people will look at the man, and compare him 
with the servile. All men, of whatever party, must approve the 
course of him who frankly avows his sentiments ; and all must 
pity him who has not the moral courage to give a vote where 
slavery is involved. 

Sir, I would commend to our'whig friends the example of the 
gentleman from the old Bay State, who recently spoke so boldly 
on this question. I greatly desire to see gentlemen on this side 
of the hall speak as boldly as he did. I know there are some 
who hold the same sentiments. I hope they will not hesitate to 
express them. And I also desire to see all who hold that it is 
our duty to maintain the compromise, to lend our influence to 
the support of slavery and of the slave-trade, come forth, and 
say so manfully, as becomes those who represent an enlightened 
people. This expression of our honest sentiments is due to the 
people ; it is due to ourselves. We have been pained at exhi- 
bitions of tergiversations here ; at the exposure of gentlemen 



THE COMPROMISE MEASURES. 481 

they once get here, turn round and swear allegiance to slavery. 
There is no excuse for this deception. If our constituents 
desire us to act for slavery, let us do it openly and boldly. If 
they wish us to maintain the cause of freedom, let us do it man- 
fully, or resign our seats in this body ; but let us not deceive 
those who honor us with their confidence. 

Again, Sir, by maintaining the compromise, we shall uphold 
the fugitive law, with all its infamous and unconstitutional pro- 
visions. The constitutional provisions, in regard to fugitives 
from labor, have been so often argued by me, that I will not, on 
the present occasion, repeat my views. I will only say, that a 
proposition to involve the people of the free States in the 
expense and disgrace of arresting and imprisoning fugitive 
slaves, was offered to the Convention that framed the Consti- 
tution ; that the proposal was objected to ; and so strong were 
the objections, that the member who offered it withdrew it, not 
daring to take a vote of the Convention. We are all aware 
that on that occasion no member expressed the opinion that the 
people of the free States were bound by that instrument, or by 
any moral or political principle, to participate in the expense or 
the disgrace of capturing fugitive slaves. We know, histori- 
cally, that it was the intention of the framers of that instru- 
ment to do no more than to secure to the master the same right 
to pursue and capture his slave in a free State, that he pos- 
sessed to pursue and capture his horse or mule. We are not 
to obstruct the master in reclaiming him. This was the view 
expressed by the Supreme Court, in the case of Prigg v. the 
Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. 

This is perfectly consistent with the views of the gentleman 
from Massachusetts, (Mr. Rantoul,) who, I think, has taken 
the ground entertained at the time the Constitution was 
adopted by the people in their several State conventions. But, 
for the sake of the argument, I will go beyond him, and admit 
that Congress possesses the right to legislate so far as to secure 
the owner in the exercise of this right ; that we may, by legis- 
lation, punish any person who interferes with that privilege, 
either by making such interference penal, or giving a compen- 
41 



482 THE COMPROMISE MEASURES. 

sation to the owner. This was the view evidently entertained 
by the Congress of 1793. They endeavored to effect this 
object ; but there they stopped. They made no attempt to 
involve this government or the people of the free States in the 
burdens, expense, and disgrace of catching and sending the 
trembling fugitive back to bondage. 

Here, Sir, at this precise point, I take issue upon the consti- 
tutionality of that portion of the law of 1850, which imposes 
upon this government the burden, expense, and disgrace of 
chasing down the flying bondman, and sending him back in 
chains. 

Those portions of the law which authorize and require the 
appointment of officers to grant process for the arrest of slaves ; 
that part which makes it the duty of judges to grant such pro- 
cess ; that part which directs marshals and deputy-marshals to 
arrest the slave ; which authorizes them to call on the people 
to assist in that piratical work ; which renders it penal for a 
man to feed a famishing or starving fugitive, by which he shall 
be strengthened and enabled to pursue his flight ; which involves 
the people of the free States in the expense of sending the fugi- 
tive back, — these provisions are each of them unconstitutional, 
unjust, abhorrent to the principles and the feelings of the peo- 
ple of the North, inhuman and barbarous. 

Mr. Chairman, it has pleased certain gentlemen, on various 
occasions, to allude to myself and my political friends, as op- 
posed to the Constitution. They will not meet our arguments 
on this point. They recoil from legitimate debate, and seek to 
misrepresent us by general charges, carefully avoiding every 
specific point. I now repeat, that, to the full extent to which 
the law of 1850 involves this government, its officers, and the 
people of the free States in the burden, the expense, and dis- 
grace of recapturing and returning fugitive slaves, it is uncon- 
stitutional. 

And, Sir, I here desire to understand if there be a member 
from Ohio, or from any free State east of it, who denies this 
position ? Is there one who holds that his constituents and 
himself are bound to participate in the expense and crime of 






THE COMPROMISE MEASURES. 483 

chasing slaves ? If so, I desire that he will announce the fact. 
I long to find one such public man ; and if there be one here, I 
wish he would avow it. 

No, Mr. Speaker, I blush for my country, when her repre- 
sentatives take shelter behind unmeaning generalities, and 
refuse to avow their honest sentiments. 

If gentlemen intend to support the compromise, they must of 
course intend to chase down the trembling female, as she flees 
from the inhumanity of a worse than savage oppressor. And, 
in the opinion of some men, no candidate is fit for President or 
other office, unless he is willing thus to degrade himself in view 
of those who respect the dignity of our race. 

Mr. Chairman, we are under neither moral nor political obli- 
gations to legislate on the subject. We may leave it as it is, 
and wash our hands of all its guilt, if we choose. 

Mr. Chairman, for sixty years this construction of the Con- 
stitution has been acknowledged and observed. During that 
period, no statesman advanced the revolting doctrine of sub- 
jecting the laboring men of the North to the disgrace of catch- 
ing slaves. The history of our government shows this fact, 
and coming ages will read it. This law, which takes from the 
laboring men of the North a portion of their earnings, to pay 
for catching and returning fugitive slaves, is a thousand times 
more repugnant to their feelings than was the stamp act, or the 
tax on tea. Under this law, they are involved in supporting 
an institution which they detest ; compelled to contribute to the 
commission of crimes abhorrent to humanity. This oppression, 
this violation of conscience and of their constitutional rights, 
this tyranny they feel and deprecate. It is impossible that an 
intelligent, a patriotic people, can long be subjected to such 
violations of their rights and the rights of humanity. 

The conscience of the nation cannot be long separated from 
its government. It will be in vain for navy-yard chaplains to 
deliver lectures, and write essays, to convince our people that 
it is their duty to uphold the slave-trade and the fugitive law. 
It will be in vain for " ministers of the lower law," to preach 
up the duty of Christians to commit crimes against God and 



484 THE COMPROMISE MEASURES. 

humanity, at the contemplation of which our very natures re- 
volt. The voice of reason and of conscience will find utter- 
ance. The escape of Shadrach at Boston,' the just and holy 
manifestation of the popular mind at Syracuse, the merited 
death of Gorsuch at Christiana, should teach the advocates of 
the fugitive law, and of the compromise, that the " higher law " 
of our natures, dictated by God, and imprinted upon the hearts 
of a Christian people, will eventually set these barbarous 
enactments at defiance. The shooting slaves in the mountains 
of Pennsylvania, the inhuman murder of a fugitive in Indiana, 
as stated in the public papers, could not fail to be followed by 
the resistance to which I have referred. 

The slaves, as already stated, are to increase ; the number 
of fugitives will of course increase more rapidly. Our rail- 
roads, steamboats, and the vast increase of intercommunication 
between our free and slave States, cannot fail to carry knowl- 
edge and intelligence to the whole colored population, North 
and South. With them there must be hostility and hatred to- 
wards their oppressors, whether they be slave-holders, or the 
allies of slavery. It is a law of the human mind. All honest 
men must unite in the acknowledgment of their rights. It is 
our duty to carry intelligence to every being who bears the 
image of our Creator. Thousands of agencies are at work, 
bearing information to the oppressed and down-trodden of our 
land. 

By an inscrutable law which pervades the moral world, our 
very efforts to sustain slavery are converted into the means of 
its overthrow. The slave-trade hi this district is upheld for the 
purpose of sustaining slavery in our southern States. But 
where is the reflecting man, who does not see that every slave 
sold from this city carries with him intelligence of his rights, 
and becomes a missionary of freedom when transferred South ? 
Why, Sir, in that mournful procession of fifty-two victims of 
this infamous commerce, taken from this city in 1848, was an 
individual of unusual intellect. His name was Edmondson. 
He called on me at different times to aid him in raising money 
to redeem his sisters. They were, however, sold, and subse- 



THE COMPROMISE MEASURES. 485 

• 

quently repurchased by some benevolent people at the East, 
and are now free. I am told that his whole family were en- 
dowed with intellects of the highest order. He was himself, so 
far as propriety of language, gentlemanly deportment, and 
intelligence are concerned, not the inferior of gentlemen here, 
or of the President of the United States. But he was a vic- 
tim to this slave-trade ; and unless he now sleeps in a servile 
grave, he is preparing the minds of southern slaves for that 
work which lies before them ; a work which, if not accom- 
plished by the voice of truth and justice, will be perfected in 
blood. That, too, is the case with every fugitive slave who is 
returned to bondage. The whole northern slave population are 
becoming intelligent. They read, or hear read, the discussions 
of our northern press. They learn what is said in this hall. 
The remarks I am now making will reach the ears of many 
thousands who are borne down by oppression. To them I say, 
"All men are created equal;" "you are endowed by your 
Creator with an inalienable right to liberty ; " and I add the 
words of one of Virginia's noblest sons, "give me liberty, or 
give me death" 

Mr. Chairman, the day of redemption for this people must 
come. No human power can prevent it. All reason, philoso- 
phy, and history demonstrate the approach of that day. Look 
at the British West Indies. There the Africans for centuries 
labored under the scourge; they clanked their chains; they 
toiled and wept under the hand of oppression. But they in- 
creased in numbers, as do the slaves of our southern States. 
Their oppressors became enervated by indolence and luxury, 
while the slaves increased in numbers, in knowledge, and in 
power, precisely as do the slaves of this land, sarcastically 
called a land of freedom. They became an expense to their 
government, as do ours. That expense increased, as ours does, 
until the government had no other course than to purchase 
them and set them free. The same result is intended by those 
who now advocate the compromise, which is nothing more nor 
less than an attempt to throw the burden of abolishing sla- 
very upon this federal government. 

41* 



486 THE COMPROMISE MEASURES. 

• 

As was well remarked by the gentleman from Massachusetts, 
(Mr. Kantoul,) it is a federal measure, a centralizing mea- 
sure, calculated to concentrate power in this government, and 
to destroy the influence of the States. The plan has often 
been hinted, and this day it is more than hinted, in the leading 
organ of the administration of this city. This grand scheme 
will subject the nation to a debt of one billion two hundred 
million dollars, — a debt one-third greater than that of Eng- 
land, — a debt that to an indefinite period will weigh down the 
laboring men of this nation, cripple our energies, and bring 
upon us the oppression, the suffering, which now render the 
English peasantry the subjects of pity throughout the civilized 
world. The compromise is but the incipient step to this final 
consummation. If we are now willing to subject the funds of 
the nation to sustain this institution, — if we silently submit to 
this compromise, I assert, without hesitation, that a proposi- 
tion to relieve ourselves from this burden, by the purchase of 
the slaves of the nation, will be made at no distant day. I 
therefore say to the laboring men of the North of all parties, 
your constitutional rights, your liberties, are in danger. To pay 
one billion two hundred million dollars would, however, be far 
less degrading to the northern character than this fugitive law. 

While the old party issues have been fading away, the great 
and overshadowing questions of humanity have been increas- 
ing, strengthening, and extending throughout the nation. Jus- 
tice to the enslaved has entered into all our moral and political 
controversies. It is discussed in our social circles, our political 
conventions, and our pulpits. It occupies the attention of our 
State legislatures and of Congress. Europe sympathizes with 
us in this great work. The question of man's right to his life 
and liberty, now occupies the attention of the civilized world. 
It has thrown Europe into commotion. Her people, her states- 
men, are discussing it. It has taken an undying grasp upon 
I the conscience, the judgment of this people. The agitation will 
go on, until this government shall be redeemed and regenerated 
from oppression, until the stain of slavery shall be wiped from 
our national escutcheon. 



THE COMPROMISE MEASURES. 487 

Let me assure gentlemen that a noble band of patriots, of 
philanthropists, are now laboring to bring about this " consum- 
mation so devoutly to be wished." Upon the broad basis of 
truth, of justice, of equal rights, of the brotherhood of man 
and of nations, we have taken our stand. Our numbers are 
increasing. The effects of our labors are becoming manifest. 
Our cause is advancing. Our moral and political influence is 
extending, and our final triumph is certain. We have no hos- 
tility to any party. Our contest is waged against oppression in 
all its forms, — against tyranny and usurpation. Nor will we 
cease our warfare, until victory, rendered glorious by results 
that will reach forward to man's remotest existence, shall crown 
our toils 

[Here the hammer fell.] 



THE BALTIMORE PLATFORMS. 



THEY NOW CONSTITUTE THE POLITICAL CREED OF THEIR PARTIES — THEY 
AGREE IN PRINCIPLE— NO ISSUE BETWEEN THEM — BOTH THOSE PAR- 
TIES ARE COMMITTED TO SUPPORT THE COMPROMISE MEASURES — TO 
SUPPRESS DISCUSSION — THEIR COMBINED INFLUENCE DEFIED — AGITA- 
TION WILL CONTINUE — IT IS AN ELEMENT IN ALL REFORMS — REASONS 
WHY WHIGS AND DEMOCRATS WISH TO SUPPRESS IT — ITS EFFECT ON 
PUBLIC MEN — ON PUBLIC MEASURES — THE ORGANIZATION OF THE FREE 
DEMOCRACY VINDICATED. 

[At the Democratic National Convention of 1852, that party resolved to sus- 
tain the compromise measures, and to resist all attempts to renew agitation on 
the slave question. Many of the northern whigs professed opposition to those 
measures, and declared that their party would not follow the lead of the demo- 
crats. They insisted that the free democracy ought to vote with them. Many 
of the free democracy appeared to waver in their faith, and proposed a union 
with the whigs ; while a portion of the free democx-atic press appeared to be 
undecided. 

When the Whig Convention assembled, however, that party took position 
nearly upon the same principles. Many leading friends of liberty appeared to 
despond ; it was a time of darkness and trial to the advocates of humanity : 
and the author of these speeches felt greatly oppressed by the, discouraging 
circumstances around him; but availed himself of the earliest opportunity, 
after the close of the whig national convention, to deliver the following speech.] 

Mr. Chairman, — The two great political parties of the 
nation have held their conventions. From all parts of these 
United States delegates have assembled, deliberated upon their 
platform of principles, avowed their doctrines, nominated their 
candidates for President and Vice-President, and now have 

* Speech on the bill to supply deficiency of appropriations. Delivered in 
Committee of the whole House on the state of the Union, June 23, 1852. 



THE BALTIMORE PLATFORMS. 489 

entered upon the presidential campaign. Preparatory to this 
state of things many speeches were made here, to which the 
free democrats, the advocates of liberty, listened with com- 
mendable attention. And now I rise to occupy a brief hour in 
vindicating the position of the party to which I am attached. 
Often, during the last six months, the question has been pro- 
pounded to me, whether we should vote for the candidates of 
the whig or the democratic party ? This question, so far as I 
am concerned, will probably be answered satisfactorily before I 
take my seat. 

It is not my purpose to examine very critically the principles 
of those parties. It may be sufficient for me to remark, that 
they agree as to the policy which ought to control our govern- 
ment. The democrats first avowed their doctrines. Their 
confession of political faith having been two weeks before the 
public, and being read and duly considered before the assem- 
bling of the Whig Convention, that body took issue upon none 
of the doctrines avowed, nor upon the policy maintained by the 
democrats. 

I notice in some papers that much is said in relation to " in- 
ternal improvements." The democrats say, "the Constitution 
does not confer upon the General Government power to com- 
mence and carry on a system of internal improvements." Do 
the whigs take issue on this general and unmeaning assertion ? 
Not at all. They answer, " the Constitution vests in Congress 
power to open and improve harbors, remove obstructions in 
navigable rivers, &c, said improvements being in every in- 
stance national and general in their character." Now, Sir, no 
democrat ever did, or ever will, deny this doctrine. So, too, 
the democrats make assertions about " fostering one branch of 
industry to the detriment of another ; " and the whigs refuse the 
issue thus tendered, but, in answer, assert doctrines which no 
democrat denies. The democrats attempt to galvanize into 
existence the obsolete idea of a national bank, to which the 
whigs make no reply, admitting by their silence the democratic 
faith. Neither advances a principle which is denied by the 
other ; they stand on the record in perfect harmony. And no 



490 THE BALTIMORE PLATFORMS. 

other contest exists than a strife for office, for place, and 
power ; for the spoils, the loaves and fishes. 

This is the first time, for many years, that these parties have 
each put forth an avowal of their doctrines. In the change of 
times, and the ordinary course of events, they now find them- 
selves in perfect harmony with each other. The day of their 
contention and disagreement has passed away. The issues 
which once really existed between them have become obsolete, 
or surrendered. Their usefulness is at an end, and their his- 
tory will soon be written. The increase of intelligence, the 
improvements of the age, demand new organizations and new 
parties. For years, the old parties have intermingled con- 
stantly, and no influence has been able to keep them separate. 
Here, and throughout the country, some whigs act with the 
democratic party, and some democrats act with the whig party. 
For the last four years, there has been no matter of legislation 
before this body, on which the members have arrayed them- 
selves according to their party character. On every question, 
a portion of whigs have acted with the democrats, and a por- 
tion of democrats have acted with the whigs. Indeed, Sir, 
those who have watched the proceedings here for the past few 
years, could not fail to see that slavery constitutes the only 
question of interest before us. 

Notwithstanding the whigs and democrats are acting in per- 
fect harmony with each other, they have united in tendering to 
the friends of liberty important issues. One of those issues is 
so extraordinary, that it demands my first attention. The prop- 
osition is to stifle all further examination of chattel slavery, and 
is expressed by the democrats in the following language : 

" Resolved, That the democratic party will resist all attempts at renewing, in 
Congress or out of it, the agitation of the slavery question, under whatever 
shape or color the attempt may be made." 

The whigs resolved, — 

" That . . . we will discountenance all efforts to continue or renew such agi- 
tation, whenever, wherever, and however made." 

We, Sir, the free democracy, will agitate the subject of sla- 
very, and its correlative, freedom. Here, Sir, is an issue formed 



THE BALTIMORE PLATFORMS. 491 

between us. I, Sir, am about to agitate this question. I 
intend to speak plainly of slavery, of its most revolting features. 
I will endeavor to use no offensive language, but I will talk of 
the practice followed by men in this district, of purchasing slave 
women, and then selling their own children into bondage. Now 
when I do this, the democrats are bound to resist, and the whigs 
to discountenance, my efforts. In order that we may start with 
a perfect understanding of this conflict, I desire to learn the 
manner in which the democrats will manifest their resistance. 
I am now agitating this subject, and what will you do about it? 

Now I hope gentlemen will not feel any particular delicacy 
in showing their resistance. Do not be alarmed ; just stand up 
here, and now, before the country ; show your resistance. Be 
not afraid, gentlemen ; I am less than the stripling of Israel, 
who went forth to meet Goliath. You stand pledged to resist 
God's truth, — to silence the tongues of freemen. I meet you, 
and hurl defiance at you and your infamous attempts to stifle 
the freedom of speech. And now, who speaks for the carrying 
out of this resolution ? 

Mr. Chairman, we may " call spirits from the vasty deep," 
but they will not come. 

I repeat to the democrats, — I want to know what you are 
going to do ? You are pledged to resist. 

The whigs, in their convention, also resolved that they " will 
discountenance all efforts to continue or renew such agitation, 
whenever, wherever, and however the attempt may be made." 
The language of this resolution differs from that of the democ- 
racy, but its spirit and object are the same. They intend to 
suppress the freedom of speech, here and among the people. 
On this point, the two great parties of the nation have cordially 
united. A coalition for a more odious purpose could not have 
been formed. Duty to myself, to this body, and the country, 
demands an exposure of this conspiracy against the Constitu- 
tion, against the rights of members here, against the people. 

Mr. Chairman, is it contemplated to silence the popular 
voice in this hall? If that be not the case, these resolutions 
mean nothing. They are mere " brutum fulmen," made for 



492 THE BALTIMORE PLATFORMS. 

show, to frighten men of weak nerves. They may do very 
well among doughfaces ; but when those parties attempt to 
frighten free soilers, they should better understand the charac- 
ter of their opponents. 

The Constitution has provided " that Congress shall pass no 
law abridging the freedom of speech." That Constitution we 
have sworn to support, and by the blood of our ancestors we 
will maintain it. Slave-holders and doughfaces, whigs and 
democrats, may combine to trample that sacred instrument 
under their feet, by suppressing the freedom of speech ; but, 
Sir, they have not the moral, nor the political power, to effect 
that object. 

Agitation or discussion is not only to be put down here, but 
among the people ; they are to have no more anti-slavery meet- 
ings ; no more free soil conventions ; no more sermons in favor 
of God's law ; no more prayers to heaven for the oppressed of 
our land ; the declaration of independence is to be burned ; our 
printing establishments broken up, and our social circles are to 
speak no more of the rights of all men to enjoy life and liberty. 
A new political police is to be established, and the American 
people placed under slave-holding surveillance. Our literary 
writers are to be driven into exile. But I am paying unde- 
served attention to these base, these puerile attempts to stifle 
discussion on the subject of humanity. I hold these resolutions 
in unutterable contempt. I trample them under my feet. 

And here I will leave this ridiculous attempt to ape the des- 
potisms of Europe, by stifling discussion upon the absorbing 
question of liberty. 

I will now proceed to examine the reasons why these resolu- 
tions were adopted. 

Why should these parties, in their national conventions, take 
Congress, the Constitution, and people, under their control, and 
command universal silence upon certain measures? Evidently 
because investigation and discussion would endanger the future 
success of their organizations. The very proposition shows that 
they have no confidence in the people. The man or party who 
strives to silence discussion, to shut out truth, admits that he is 



THE BALTIMORE PLATFORMS. 493 

in error. No man or party who feels that he is right, hesitates 
to let the whole truth be known. He feels that he will be vin- 
dicated by the development of truth, and his honor will be sus- 
tained. 

But why should the whigs and democrats unite to keep the 
truth from the public eye, in regard to the compromise meas- 
ures ? Why, Sir, the first of those measures was, that estab- 
lishing territorial government in Utah, admitting slavery and 
the slave-trade to be established there, on soil consecrated to 
freedom by Mexican laws. I well know the people were told 
that slavery could not go there, as it was excluded by the laws 
of God. Well, Sir, official documents now show that assertion 
to have been a gigantic falsehood. The census returns show 
that slavery exists there ; that man is there held in bondage, 
lashed into subjection by his fellow man ; women are sold like 
swine in the market, and children made subjects of barter. 

Now, Sir, we free democrats insist that slavery and the 
slave-trade should be excluded from that territory. The motto 
of our party is, " no slave territory." We do not believe it 
right tlus to deal in God's image. But this law, which per- 
mits these outrages, the whigs and democrats say, is a final set- 
tlement, that these practices may continue in all coming time. 
But they dare not go before the people admitting this truth ; 
nor dare they deny these facts. To avoid this unpleasant 
question, they resolve to resist every attempt to speak or write 
upon it. Their only way of escaping from popular odium is to 
keep truth from the people. Now, Sir, does any democrat or 
any whig believe that free soilers will vote for any candidate 
pledged to sustain those revolting practices ? If any one who 
ever held a place in the free democracy shall cast such a vote, 
it will be some other man than myself. 

Again, Mr. Chairman, the last Congress provided by the 
law aforesaid, that one or more States may be admitted from 
said territory, with or without slavery. They were unwilling 
that the members of the next or any future Congress should 
judge for themselves, whenever Utah shall ask admission into 
the Union ; and they have made this foolish attempt to dictate 
42 



494 THE BALTIMORE PLATFORMS. 

the action of this body in future ages. The provision is, that 
an indefinite number of slave States may be admitted. Of 
course their political power, under the Constitution, will be in 
proportion to their slaves. The man in Utah, who buys a 
slave woman, and raises four bastard children, and holds them 
as property, wields as much political power in that State, as 
four of those educated and intelligent democrats who sit before 
me add to the political influence of a free State. 

Now, Sir, we, the free democracy, are unqualifiedly opposed 
to this insult to northern dignity. We do not believe that the 
man who thus sets at defiance God's law, and tramples upon 
decency, is any better than an educated, intelligent, virtuous 
freeman of the North. But whigs and democrats say that this 
disgraceful inequality of political power shall be allowed to the 
people of Utah, and be maintained. They know that public 
indignation would be kindled against every man who would 
thus degrade the people of the North. Our freemen would hurl 
from place and power such men, if the facts were known to 
them. They therefore seek to smother the truth ; to keep the 
people in ignorance; and resolve to resist agitation, to discoun- 
tenance discussion. They pledge their candidates to carry out 
this disgraceful combination against liberty and the rights and 
honor of the free States, and then turn round and ask honest 
men, those who possess self-respect, to vote for their own dis- 
grace. Sir, free soilers, men of intelligence, will not thus stul- 
tify themselves. 

The same law, or a law with similar provisions, was enacted 
in relation to New Mexico. The people of that territory may, 
if they please, enter into this speculation in human flesh. They 
may curse that land with bondage also. Whigs and democrats 
say that this law shall be a final settlement of that subject ; 
that slavery and the slave-trade shall not be excluded; and the 
democrats are to resist, and the whigs are to discountenance, all 
discussion in relation to it. 

One or more slave States are to be admitted from New Mex- 
ico, upon the same terms of degrading inequality to the free 
States, as those from Utah, and northern men are to submit 



THE BALTIMORE PLATFORMS. 495 

without discussion. Agitation would, in the words of the whig 
resolution, endanger the peace of the whig party. They, there- 
fore, deprecate agitation. Well, Sir, the proper meaning of the 
verb " to deprecate " is to " pray against ; " and the whigs will 
therefore pray against agitation, as it will endanger their peace. 
Such prayers would simply be " an abomination ; " they would 
do no other hurt. And as for the peace of the whig party, I 
should far rather see it endangered than to see one child sold 
from its parents, or one woman flogged, or one man degraded. 

The motto of free soilers is, " no more slave States." This is 
our unyielding, determined position. We wage an exterminat- 
ing warfare against every party, which would extend the curse 
of human servitude, or increase the slave power in any degree. 
The democratic party and the whig party unite in the exten- 
sion of slavery and of the slave power, and then ask the friends 
of liberty to vote with them ! I shall not do- it. 

Another measure of the last Congress was a law entitled 
" an act to abolish the slave-trade in the District of Columbia" 
A flagrant falsehood was sent to the people in tluV title ; for 
the law itself does not profess to abolish the slave-trade in this 
district, and only excludes from this market the slave-breeders 
of Maryland and Virginia, leaving the sale of men, women, 
and children to continue here. And this commerce in the image 
of God is to go on and continue forever. The whigs say it 
shall not be disturbed, and the democrats say they too will pro*- 
tect it. These parties have taken position between us and the 
slave-dealers, and say we shall not discuss the morality of their 
vocation ; that we shall not agitate the cause of freedom. 

You, Sir, lately saw an advertisement in the leading whig 
paper of this district, in these words : " For sale, a handsome 
and accomplished lady's maid, aged just sixteen years." Ex- 
cept in this city and New Zealand, I do not think any govern- 
ment within the bounds of civilization, would have permitted 
such an outrage upon decency. I speak of New Zealand, with- 
out intending any disrespect to the people of that island by com- 
paring their habits with ours. They buy men and women for 
food only. The object is far* more honorable and Christian-like 



496 THE BALTIMORE PLATFORMS. 

than that for which the young women of this city are adver- 
tised and sold. 

Mr. Chairman, General Scott and General Pierce are both 
pledged to maintain this traffic in the bodies of women, and the 
advocates of liberty are asked to aid in electing them. Sir, let 
those parties revel in such moral and political jvickedness ; let 
them pledge themselves and their candidates to perpetrate 
crimes thus revolting to humanity ? but I beseech them not to 
insult honest men, philanthropists, and Christians, by asking 
them to participate in such transcendent iniquity. 

Another of the compromise measures is the fugitive slave 
law. Of the character of this law, I have spoken on former 
occasions. Of its unconstitutionality, I think no unprejudiced 
mind can doubt, who listened to the speech of the gentleman 
from Massachusetts, (Mr. Rantoul). Of the crimes committed 
under this law ; of the enormities of sending free men into sla- 
very, under color of this law ; of the barbarous and savage 
character of the agents selected by this, administration to carry 
it out, I have no time to speak. I noticed in the address of a 
clergyman, lately delivered before the Home Missionary Soci- 
ety, a statement that the reverend speaker was in the central 
parts of Russia during the last summer ; that an intelligent 
nobleman taunted him with the character of this fugitive law, 
saying : " You can find nothing in the legal code of Russia, nor 
in the decrees of her emperors, equal to that barbarous law." 

No, Sir ; I do not believe that any despot of Russia, or of 
Austria, was ever guilty of putting forth so barbarous a law ; 
yet the democratic party and the whig party tell us that this 
law shall remain as a final settlement of this subject. The 
whig party, it is true, reserve to themselves the right of making 
it more barbarous. But it is to remain a law and continue in 
force while time shall last. Yes, when the " archangel shall 
descend from heaven with a rainbow upon his head, and plac- 
ing one foot upon the earth and the other upon the sea, shall 
swear by Him who liveth forever and ever, that time shall be 
no longer," the dread summons shall find the people of Phila- 
delphia, New York, and Boston, upon the " qui vive" hunting 



THE BALTIMORE PLATFORMS. 497 

for slave mothers, who have fled from all else they hold dear in 
life, in order to enjoy liberty. The whigs and democrats will 
be found supporting this law ; and when they shall close their 
eyes upon terrestrial objects, they will be, listening to the bay- 
ing of bloodhounds, the clanking of chains, shrieks of slaves, 
and the roar of muskets ; while the dying groans of slaves- 
catchers, and their wounded associates, the bloodhounds ; the 
last death-sighs of murdered fugitives will all rise from this 
earth, and mingle with the archangel's voice, as he shall sum- 
mon us all to the bar of final retribution. I would speak of the 
future with solemnity ; but if men are to carry with them into 
the coming world their leading traits of character, as some 
hold, it would seem that their residence in the spirit land will 
be made vocal with the sighs, and groans, and shrieks of asso- 
ciated beings. 

But both parties and their candidates are pledged to main- 
tain this infamous law. And they will " resist " and " dis- 
countenance" all agitation in regard to it, "in Congress or out 
of it." The policy of silencing discussion upon it must be 
apparent to every man. The slave-holders demanded the pas- 
sage of this law, northern doughfaces submitted ; some voted 
for it ; others fled the hall. They then knew it would be death 
to the measure, and political obliteration to themselves, to dis- 
cuss it ; and therefore voted against its discussion, against all 
agitation, and a minority of this body actually passed it under 
the previous question ; and now whigs and democrats say it 
never shall be discussed. That when our people of the North 
see a fellow being seized, chained, dragged into slavery, and 
sold and flogged, they shall say nothing about it, here or else- 
where. That they shall look upon the murdered corpses of. 
fugitives shot down by the agents of government, and may- 
moan over their barbarity, but they must not discuss, they, 
must not agitate the repeal of this law. "Well, Sir, I assure 
them the people will discuss these things. 

But it is said, through the whig press, that we cannot repeal 
this law. I saw this morning an article, in some respects an* 
able article, denouncing this law, in a whig paper, professedly 
42* 



498 THE BALTIMORE PLATFORMS. 

anti-slavery. The editor, however, admitted that the law would 
not be repealed, perhaps, for twenty years. Sir, the admission 
shows the author to be unconscious of the people's power. 

It is this miserable, cowardly submission to the slave interest, 
which has degraded northern men. Let the people send to this 
body forty members whose hearts are devoted to freedom, who 
have confidence in the power of truth, and this law will be 
repealed in six weeks. It will be swept from our statute book, 
and curses deep and loud will rest upon its authors. 

The editor to whom I alluded, proposes that we shall con- 
tribute from the national funds to pay for fugitives. I could 
have forgiven the editor for almost any other political offence. 
What, Sir ! are we, the descendants of the Pilgrims, of those 
who bled at Bunker's Hill, and on every battle field of the Rev- 
olution, rather than pay a paltry tax on tea and on stamped 
paper, are we supinely to become tributary to southern task- 
masters ? When the barbarians of Algiers seized and enslaved 
our people, we sent an armed force there and slew them, hold- 
ing them unworthy of a place upon God's footstool. No, Sir ; 
by all the hallowed associations which cluster around the mem- 
ory of English and American patriots, »T avow that I would 
sooner see every slave-holder of the nation hanged, than to wit- 
ness the subjugation of northern freemen to such a humiliating 
condition. 

Sir, when it comes to that, I, for one, shall be prepared for 
the dernier resort, — an appeal to the God of battles. I am a 
man of peace, but am no non-resistant ; and I would sooner 
have the ashes of my hearth slaked in my own blood, and the 
blood of my children, than submit to such degradation. / And 
here I will take occasion to say, that if this law continues to be 
enforced, civil war is inevitable. The people will not submit to 
it. Why, Sir, civil war already exists. At Christiana, civil 
war, with all the circumstances of force, under color of law — 
resistance in defence of natural right — bloodshed and death 
took place. In my own State, a similar transaction occurred ; 
and I assure gentlemen that other instances will occur, if 
attempts be made to enforce that law. In my own district are 



THE BALTIMORE PLATFORMS. 499 

many fugitives who have informed their masters where they 
may be found. These men have become desperate. They 
desire to see the slave-catchers. They pant for an opportunity 
to make their oppressors " bite the dust." Sir, send on your 
commissioners and deputy-marshals and bloodhounds, and I 
assure you that a civil war will soon be in active progress. 

Gentlemen talk of enforcing this law. It cannot be done. 
The people have already passed sentence upon it and upon its 
authors ; and that sentence will be speedily executed. Nor can 
you stop agitation in regard to it. 

Agitation, discussion, and examination are the agents, the 
instruments, for carrying forward all reforms. The Saviour of 
man spoke truths boldly. They fell harshly upon the ears of 
scribes, pharisees, and hypocrites. They denounced him as an 
agitator ; seized, tried, condemned, and crucified him as an agi- 
tator. From that day to the present, every man who has 
boldly avowed truths unwelcome to the ears of despots, tyrants, 
and the oppressors of our race, have been denounced as agita- 
tors. Jefferson, in the Declaration of American Independence ; 
Samuel Adams, in the Continental Congress ; Washington, on 
the battle field, were " distinguished agitators ; " John Quincy 
Adams, while in this hall, for years maintained and defended, 
with inimitable powers, the right of petition, and was denounced 
throughout the country as an agitator. He was arraigned at the 
bar of this House, and tried as an agitator. Every member of 
this body who defends the rights of the people, is denounced as 
an agitator. To me, these epithets have lost their terrors. 

For hundreds and for thousands of years the instruction and 
elevation of mankind have been carried forward by agitation. 
By means of it, tyrants and despots have been driven from 
power, and popular rights have been extorted from barbarous 
rulers. Without agitation, no people ever gained their rights, 
or retained them, after they had been extorted from their 
oppressors. Now, suddenly, to prevent the progress of liberty, 
whigs and democrats unite to suppress this element in all 
reforms. They declare that discussion shall cease, and the 



500 THE BALTIMORE PLATFORMS. 

slave-trade and slavery shall continue forever, and the fugitive 
law shall be rendered perpetual. 

Mr. Chairman, well do I recollect the evening after these 
laws had been passed. I then viewed them in all their horrors. 
I saw the degradation to which the people of the free States 
were subjected, — the crimes which we had authorized. My 
heart sunk within me, as I contemplated the public men who 
had aimed this blow at liberty. 

Sir, on yonder avenue I heard the songs of drunken revelry 
and the insane shout ; bonfires lighted up the heavens, and the 
thunder of cannon told the immoderate joy of slave-holders, 
slave-breeders, doughfaces, and dealers in human flesh. Their 
gratitude naturally flowed out to those most instrumental in the 
passage of these laws, to which I have alluded, called the com- 
promise and fugitive law. In the fulness of their hearts and 
stomachs, they repaired to the dwelling of the Secretary of 
State, and called on him for a speech. He readily complied, 
commencing his congratulations by saying, " Now is the winter 
of our discontent made glorious summer." He then informed 
the motley crew around him that this question of slavery was 
settled, and that they were no more to be troubled with agita- 
tion. 

Sir, from that day up to the close of the Baltimore Conven- 
tion, he wrote letters and made speeches declaring and avowing 
that agitation had ceased ; assuring the country in substance 
that the slave-trade in this district and in our territories would 
go on undisturbed. That oppression here and in the territories 
now had nothing to fear. The whole energies of the govern- 
ment were put forth to enforce the fugitive law ; but they gen- 
erally proved abortive. Every possible exertion was made in 
Boston and Philadelphia to convict those charged with obstruct- 
ing its execution ; but all failed. The blood of Gorsuch, a 
piratical slave-catcher, who fell at Christiana, is unavenged, in 
spite of the public treasure and Executive influence put forth 
to obtain a conviction of those who righteously slew him. The 
patriots who assisted Shadrach to escape the fangs of the Bos- 



THE BALTIMORE PLATFORMS. 501 

ton bloodhounds, yet laugh to scorn your infamous law. At 
Syracuse, at Rochester, and a hundred other places, the friends 
of liberty rejoice at the impotency of this law, although it has 
thus far been backed up by Executive power. These defeats 
of the Executive, and of this enactment, libellously called a 
law, have resulted from agitation ; and well may slave-catchers 
and doughfaces now seek to stifle discussion, to silence the J 
people. 

Sir, while these things were going forward, the Secretary of 
State was looking for, and expecting a return for the services 
he had rendered the slave power. The presidential chair and 
White House was looked to as the reward for his treason to 
God and humanity. But there again agitation had done its 
work. All reflecting men knew that he could receive in the 
whole Union scarcely twenty electoral votes. And when the 
Baltimore Convention passed upon his claims, not a southern 
vote was cast for him. Chagrined, mortified, and discontented, 
he will soon retire, and history will record the truth concerning 
him and us. But, Sir, I will not aggravate the chills of politi- 
cal death, nor call to mind the sins which must " sit heavy on 
his soul," when a darker night shall close around him. 

Agitation has brought to the scaffold another conspicuous vic- 
tim. The President of these United States lent his whole influ- 
ence to the promotion of those compromise measures to which I 
have alluded. His devotion to the slave power has been openly 
and boldly avowed. Steadily and basely has he prostituted the 
influence and power of his offipe to the purpose of supporting 
slavery, oppression, and crime. At the Baltimore Convention, 
the slave-holders, I believe, were unanimously in his favor. 
But northern delegates dared not support him. Agitation had 
informed the people of his having deserted their cause, and gone 
over to the enemies of freedom. The popular voice of the 
North had pronounced his doom ; he was cast aside ; the polit- 
ical grave yawns for him ; and on the 3d of March he will be 
laid in it. Were I to write the epitaphs of these men, I would 
inscribe upon their tombs, " killed by agitation." Think you 



502 THE BALTIMORE PLATFORMS. 

not that these men and their party have cause for their hostility 
to discussion — to the dissemination of truth ? 

The democrats, also, have cause for opposing agitation. 
Their ablest, their most experienced statesmen, have fallen 
victims to it. General Cass, the man who of all their candi- 
dates was best qualified for the presidency, in an evil hour 
signed a letter pledging himself to these compromise measures. 
It proved his political death-warrant. When, too late, he found 
that the people of the North would sustain no man who had 
thus pledged his influence to measures which the popular voice 
has condemned as barbarous, as disgraceful to our nation. At 
the Baltimore Convention his friends bore him to his political 
grave; and 

" Not a drum was heard, nor a funeral note," 

as they quietly deposited his remains in their final resting-place ; 
Such, too, was the fate of Pennsylvania's favorite statesman. 
He had long been anxious to serve the slave interest. He 
pledged himself in the most unqualified manner to maintain 
these laws as a perpetual settlement of the slave question. 
But he, too, was cast aside at an advanced age, when he can 
look for no further preferment. These men all died of" eating 
southern dirt." 

Circumstances appear to render it indelicate for me to speak 
of other candidates of the democratic party. Yet I would 
remind them all of the fate which must await those public men 
who prove false to liberty and humanity.* I assure them and 
the country that agitation will continue and increase until the 
people of the free States shall be relieved from all participa- 
tion in the disgrace and crimes of slavery. 

But this opposition to freedom, so dominant in the whig and 
democratic parties, led to the organization of the friends of 
liberty into a separate political party in 1848. The extraordi- 
nary circumstances which then surrounded the advocates of 

* Senators Houston and Douglas, who had been candidates for nomination, 
were present, listening to this speech. 



THE BALTIMORE PLATFORMS. 503 

freedom, called together a mighty host. On the memorable 
ninth of August of that year, fifty thousand freemen met in 
solemn convocation. There were men of distinction, men of 
intellect, statesmen, and philanthropists. They were conscious 
of the responsibility resting upon them. In framing a confes- 
sion of their political faith, they laid its foundations upon the 
enduring, eternal principles of justice. The equal right of all 
men to enjoy life, liberty, and happiness, constitutes the basis 
of our creed ; and the next article asserts " that governments 
are constituted among men to secure these rights." All our 
action under the Constitution should be to protect the life and 
liberty of every human being within our exclusive jurisdiction. 
That our legislative powers in this district, on the high seas, in 
our territories, should be exerted to secure every being who 
bears God's image, in his right to life and liberty, instead of 
establishing and sustaining oppression and slavery. Here, Sir, 
at this point, an issue between us and the other parties, deep 
and broad, is presented. And from this position the friends of 
humanity will never depart. 

It is an important fact, that neither the whig nor the demo- 
cratic party profess to pay any respect or attention to moral 
principles in their legislation. By their practice they deny the 
responsibility of human action, so far as politics are concerned. 
They hold that members of this body may pass laws which de- 
prive our fellow men of life or liberty, and that those who 
enact such laws are not morally guilty of enslaving or murder- 
ing their fellow men. We, Sir, hold that those who enacted the 
fugitive slave law are as guilty in the sight of God and good 
men, as they would be were they themselves to seize a white 
man, place irons upon his limbs, and send him to slavery with- 
out law. In such crimes, we, the advocates of freedom, will 
not participate. One of our resolutions adopted at Buffalo was 
in these words : 

" Resolved, That it is the duty of the Federal Goveniment to relieve itself 
from all responsibility for the existence or continuance of slavery, wherever it 
possesses constitutional authority to legislate on that subject." 

This resolution is in direct and unqualified conflict with the 



504 THE BALTIMORE PLATFORMS. 

entire policy of the whig and democratic parties relative to 
slavery. It is in conflict with the platforms of those parties, to 
which I have called attention. Basing our whole political 
action upon the plainest principles of justice, liberty, and hu- 
manity, we challenge examination, discussion, agitation. We 
seek to cover up nothing, to keep nothing from the popular 
ear. The more you examine and discuss our doctrines and 
policy, the better are we pleased. 

We, Sir, would drive the slave question from discussion in 
this hall. It never had a constitutional existence here. Sep- 
arate this government from all interference with slavery ; let 
the federal power wash its hands of that institution ; let us 
purify ourselves from its contagion ; leave it with the States, 
which alone have the power to sustain it, — then, Sir, will agi- 
tation cease in regard to it here ; then we shall have nothing to 
do with it, our time will no more be occupied with it ; and, like 
a band of freemen we can meet here, legislate for freedom, for 
the prosperity, the improvement of mankind, for the elevation 
of our race. 

Mr. Chairman, I have served in this hall some fifteen years. 
During that period, I think at least two-thirds of the time of 
this body has been occupied by the subject of slavery, and 
other matters connected with that institution. For the last 
three years, we can scarcely be said to have done anything else 
but discuss and legislate for slavery. This, Sir, is all wrong. 
Slavery is a local institution, existing only in a portion of the 
States. The attempt to nationalize it, is unwarranted and un- 
constitutional. To do this, is now the object of both the whig 
and democratic parties. Against these attempts, we, the free 
democracy, wage unceasing, undying, unyielding hostility. This 
war we shall never give up. We shall never lay aside our 
arms until victory shall crown our efforts, — until this govern- 
ment shall be redeemed and disenthralled from the foul stain of 
chattel slavery. Against oppression, in all its forms, and in all 
places, we have sworn eternal hostility. Our sympathy for 
suffering humanity is broad as creation, reaching to all climes, 
and embracing all who bear the image of our Creator. To 



THE BALTIMORE PLATFORMS. 505 

persecuted Hungary we tender the assurance that " we feel for 
those in bonds as bound with them." On this subject, the dem- 
ocrats have spoken oracularly. 

The whigs talk about " entangling alliances, and standing on 
foreign soil ; " but they dare not take distinct issue on the pro- 
priety of exerting our moral power, our political influence, to 
maintain the law of nations. Substantially, both whigs and 
democrats are opposed to us on this subject. They would per- 
mit Russia or Austria to swallow up Hungary, without any 
protest or expression of our disapprobation. We sympathize 
with the oppressed of all nations ; and we, the free democracy, 
literally constitute the party of progress. At Buffalo, we 
adopted the policy of " cheap postage for the people ; " and 
inscribed it upon our banner, and unfurled it to the breeze. 
We foresaw the advantages of increasing the facilities of com- 
munication among the masses, and determined to confer upon 
our country these benefits, while whigs and democrats were too 
timid to take a position either for or against it. 

I am aware that we are often charged with being men of one 
idea, — indeed, we are sometimes called the party of one 
idea, — and I refer to these facts to vindicate ourselves from 
that charge. We dared go where neither of those parties were 
willing to follow us, nor to oppose us ; and in less than three 
years the correctness of our position has been acknowledged 
before the country. 

" Lands for the poor, homes for the destitute," free of ex- 
pense to all who will immigrate to the West, was another arti- 
cle in our political creed. To this policy, neither the whig nor 
democratic party dared express their consent ; nor dared they 
oppose it. At this session, a bill carrying out our views on this 
subject, passed this body by a vote of nearly two to one. The 
Senate will doubtless comply with the popular will of the 
nation, by passing this measure of benevolence, which will 
cause thousands of hearts to swell with gratitude and joy. Sir, 
the free democracy believe that governments were constituted 
to protect, elevate, and render our race, our whole race, more 
happy. That it is our duty as statesmen, as philanthropists, as 

43 



506 THE BALTIMORE PLATFORMS. 

Christians, so far as we have constitutional power, " to raise up 
the bowed down," " to exalt the humble," " to inform the ignor- 
ant," " to comfort the distressed," and increase the prosperity 
and happiness of all who come within the sphere of our politi- 
cal, our moral, or our religious influence. Of course, we are 
hostile to those compromise measures which the whigs and 
democrats are pledged to sustain. 

In 1848, nearly three hundred thousand freemen cast their 
votes for our presidential candidate. Since that period, our 
moral and political power has greatly increased. Probably 
one third of the members on this floor are indebted to men who 
sympathize with us for their seats, and many were elected 
solely and entirely upon our principles. Three members of 
the Senate were elected as free democrats, while others are 
partially indebted to the votes of the free democracy. In 
several State legislatures we hold the balance of power ; but 
this is but little evidence of the rapidity with which our prin- 
ciples are extending. Our progress is marked by the change 
of feeling towards our doctrines in both the other parties ; 
their hostility is diminishing daily ; they are becoming ac- 
quainted with our views, and, of course, respect our motives. 
In all elections now, throughout most of the free States, candi- 
dates are selected whose doctrines and principles are not obnox- 
ious to us. The cloud which, in 1848, was like unto a man's 
Jband in size, has now overspread the whole North, and will 
soon extend over the nation, and finally over the w r orld. But 
it is said that those friends in the State of New York, who 
came from the democratic party, have returned to it. I deeply 
feel and deplore this fact. I loved and honored them, — I still 
xespect them ; but I must say that, in my judgment, they have 
erred in departing from us. I, however, will not judge them ; 
to their own masters they stand or fall. Had they continued 
with us, there is, in my opinion, no doubt that we should, in 
November next, have effected the election of a President favor- 
able to our views. That they are friends of liberty, I know ; 
that they will sustain the doctrines laid down in the democratic 
confession of faith, or vote for Pierce and King under the cir- 



THE BALTIMORE PLATFORMS. 507 

cumstances attending their nomination, I do not believe. The 
members of our party, generally, entered upon an organization 
with a deep feeling and conviction that such an organization 
was necessary. Time and experience has confirmed us in that 
opinion. I have stated the basis of our doctrines ; they are 
permanent, eternal as God himself. While standing on those 
principles, we cannot be wrong. The political and moral 
regeneration of our country, the entire reformation of this 
government from its practice of sustaining oppression, slavery, 
and crime, is our object. To effect this great and holy pur- 
pose, must require time and perseverance. In what I have 
said and done on these questions, I have but reflected the sen- 
timents and feelings of those I represent, — indeed, among them 
are many, very many, " older and better soldiers " than myself. 
That people, Sir, will stand firmly, steadfast, and immovable, 
upon the doctrines and the organization which they have 
adopted. 

I am aware of the arguments so often used to persuade free 
soilers to vote for this or that man, for this or that party, in 
order to gain some supposed temporary advantage. But, Sir,, 
we organized for the maintenance of doctrines important not 
merely to the people of a township, a county, or a State, but 
to man wherever he is found, — important not merely to-day, 
at this election, or next year, but in all coming time. Can we 
leave such a position, to unite with either of the other 
parties, in order to elect this or that man to office, while he 
stands pledged to maintain slavery and the slave-trade in this 
district and in our territories, — to continue the infamous fugi- 
tive law, — to uphold and support all these measures as a final 
settlement of the subjects to which they refer, and to discoun- 
tenance all examination, discussion, or agitation, as to the pro- 
priety of these measures ? Sir, were we to unite with either 
party to elect a President thus pledged, we should lose our 
own self-respect, — we should lose the respect and confidence 
of the world. Politically, Sir, we are " a city set upon an hill, 
which cannot be hid." Throughout the country, our influence 
is felt. In this hall we wield a moral power far beyond our 



508 THE BALTIMORE PLATFORMS. 

numbers. Let no man charge me with indelicacy when I assert, 
that the free soilers of this body exert all the influence to which 
their numbers entitle them. Whigs and democrats have confi- 
dence that we shall in all cases be guided by judgment, by 
reason and justice, and not by the paltry considerations of 
'party. 

The effect has been most salutary. Ten years since, no man 
here dared separate from his party. No matter what was the 
subject, or his own judgment, every member was compelled to 
fall into line and vote with his party leaders. Free soilers 
have set an example here of independence. The commence- 
ment of our trials on this subject was severe. "We were 
frowned upon, vilified, and denounced ; but, thank God, we had 
the firmness to bide our time, and now for years many whigs 
and democrats have followed our example, and dared to vote as 
their judgments and consciences dictated. In short, Sir, here 
party lines upon most subjects of legislation have become ob- 
literated. This of itself constitutes a great reform. 

At Baltimore, a portion of the whig party contended man- 
fully against committing themselves to the outrages and crimes 
of the fugitive law and compromise measures. In that respect, 
they did more than the democrats. My sympathies, and the 
sympathies of our party, and of all good men were with them. 

And had the anti-slavery whigs in this House and the Sen- 
ate, promptly and energetically met the supercilious preten- 
sions of the slave power with decision and firmness, I have little 
doubt they would have inspired a feeling at Baltimore which 
would have repudiated a platform that has stamped indelible 
disgrace upon their party. In this hall, the democrats have 
sustained the constitutional rights of the free States more ably 
and faithfully than the whigs have during the present session. 

But I am aware that a strong effort is making to induce our 
free democracy to sustain the whig candidate at the coming 
election. With the gentleman nominated, I have long been 
acquainted. To him nor to the democratic nominee have I any 
personal objection ; but, if elected, he is pledged to maintain 
the outrages^ the revolting crimes, pertaining to the compro- 



THE BALTIMORE PLATFORMS. 509 

mise measures and fugitive slave law, to which I have called 
attention, — to render them perpetual, so far as he may be 
able, — to prevent all discussion relating to them. To vote for 
him is to vote for this policy, — to identify ourselves in favor 
of the avowed doctrines which he is pledged to support, — to 
give proof by our votes that we approve the platform on which 
he stands. But, Sir, why vote for Scott in preference to 
Pierce ? 

The doctrines of the whig party, as I have shown, pledge 
them and their candidate to maintain slavery ; the breeding of 
slaves for market ; the sale of women in this district and in the 
territories ; to uphold the fugitive law in all coming time ; to 
admit as many slave States as shall apply from New Mexico 
and Utah, and to silence discussion on all these subjects. This 
is as far, I think, as human depravity can go. If the demo- 
cratic party has dived deeper into moral and political putridity, 
some archangel fallen must have penned their confession of 
faith. If there be such a distinction, it can only be discovered 
by a refinement of casuistry too intricate for honest minds to 
exert. Sir, suppose there were a shade of distinction in the 
depths of depravity to which these parties have descended, 
does it become men, — free men, — men of moral principle, of 
political integrity, — to be straining their visions and using 
intellectual microscopes to discover that shade of moral dark- 
ness ? No, Sir ; let every man who feels that he has a country 
to save, a character to sustain, — that he owes a duty to man- 
kind and to God, — come forward at once, and wage a bold 
and exterminating war against these doctrines, so abhorrent to 
freedom and humanity. 

But it is said that the democratic party, if defeated again by 
the anti-slavery sentiment, as they were in 1848, will disband, 
and the masses will then unite with us in support of justice, 
truth, and liberty. The defeat of the democratic party might 
disband them, and it might not. There is no certainty on that 
point. If we were to unite with the whigs, we might, or we 
might not, defeat the democrats. If we were to try the experi- 
ment and fail, whigs and democrats would despise us. We 



510 THE BALTIMORE PLATFORMS. 

should despise ourselves. If we should succeed, we should 
become identified with the whig party, and swallowed up by it. 
In every aspect in which I can view such a policy, we must 
lose the moral power which we possess. Standing upon elevat- 
ed principles, — professing, avowing, and proclaiming the polit- 
ical gospel which we present to the people, — we cannot descend 
to mingle in such a contest without a sacrifiee of that moral 
and political influence which now commands the respect of all 
honest men and of our own consciences. 

Mr. Chairman, I know not the course which the people whom 
I represent will pursue. From the past only, can I judge of 
their future action. A residence of half a century among them 
has given me some knowledge of their character. Their past 
action on this subject is " known and read of all men." 

That people do their own thinking and their own voting. 
They know their rights, and will maintain them, so far as moral 
and political action on their part will do it. They are at all 
times prepared to discharge their duty. Sir, in 1848, there was 
more political effort made to induce our friends there to vote for 
the present Executive, than was ever put forth on any other 
occasion. Distinguished gentlemen from other States, of great 
ability, and of anti-slavery sentiments, were imported, to show 
us the propriety of voting for men who feared to speak in favor 
of free principles. But those efforts failed, and few men can 
now be found who will admit that they ever cast a vote for the 
present Executive — a man who has prostituted the power of 
his office to the support of slavery and crime. Now they are 
to be called on to vote for men openly pledged and committed 
to the work of eternizing slavery and the slave-trade, and the 
fugitive law. I will leave the free democracy of the Reserve to 
speak for themselves. They have always done that. 

Sir, we are in the midst of a revolution. The two great par- 
ties are striving to convert this free government into a slave- 
holding, a slave-breeding republic. Those powers which were 
delegated to secure liberty, are now exerted to overthrow free- 
dom and the Constitution. It becomes every patriot, every 
lover of freedom, every Christian, every man, to stand forth in 



THE BALTIMORE PLATFORMS. 511 

defence of popular rights, in defence of the rights of the free 
States, of the institutions under which we live, in defence of our 
national character. 

Sir, I am getting old, — the infirmities of age are coming 
upon me. I must soon leave the scenes with which I am sur- 
rounded. It is uncertain whether I shall again address this 
body ; but one thing I ask, — that friends and foes, here and 
elsewhere, in this and in coming time, shall understand that, 
whether in public or in private, by the wayside or the fireside, 
in life or in death, I oppose, denounce, and repudiate, the efforts 
now put forth to involve the people of the free States in the 
support of slavery, of the slave-trade, and their attendant 
crimes. 



H 153 79 



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